


given limits exist

by softlyforgotten



Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco, The Young Veins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-22
Updated: 2010-08-22
Packaged: 2017-10-22 22:36:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/243336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softlyforgotten/pseuds/softlyforgotten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A circus AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	given limits exist

> Makes a cathedral, him pressing against  
> me, his lips at my neck, and yes, I do believe  
> his mouth is heaven, his kisses falling over me  
> like stars.
> 
> \-- _Saying Your Names_ , Richard Siken

The lights go down at a little past eight, sinking the tent into darkness for the three seconds it takes for the audience to fall silent. Then the band launches into the familiar, loud brass and keyboards of the opening act and the stage is flooded in red, yellow, blue, and the performers swarm on.

Every night, the same spontaneity; every night, the same second where every person in the audience catches their breath. The lights are up, and for one second the people onstage stand very still and stare back.

*

There’s no press today, no photographers being shown around, so Brendon’s already in the Big Top by the time Ryan wakes up. It takes Ryan a few moments before he remembers what he’s supposed to be doing, and then he practically jumps out of bed and gets dressed as quickly as he can. It’s annoying; he always feels like he should sleep in after opening night, and sometimes he does, and then he’s off-balance for the rest of the day.

He eats a dry packet of Ramen on his way down to the big tent in bare feet and sweat pants. Spencer is sitting at a picnic bench with Katie and Dusty, craning his head to check out Dusty’s newly made-up face from different angles, and he waves when Ryan hurries past; Ryan can just see the back of Greta’s curly hair from over the top of Gabe and Vicky’s caravan, so he figures that she’s reading on top of Smoky again. He’d stop and chat, ask what she’s reading, except he’s already behind schedule enough, seriously.

The faint sound of the Beatles is already coming from the main tent, and when Ryan ducks inside Brendon’s already up on the low trapeze, doing slow, lazy flips on the bars in time with _Ticket To Ride_. Ryan stands in the middle of the sawdust ring and grins up at him and Brendon beams, flips downwards until he’s hanging with his ankles hooked over the bar, hands reaching for Ryan.

Ryan chalks his hands and then runs up, flips himself upward so that Brendon can seize his ankles and then send them both soaring upwards. Brendon’s grip is warm and tight, and they swing just like that for a moment until Ryan forces himself up, catches onto the other bar and pulls himself into a sitting position on it. Brendon seems to hover in midair for a second, and then he’s swinging up too, nudging Ryan aside so that he can sit side-saddle on the bar with him.

“Hi,” Brendon says cheerfully. “Slept in again?”

“Fuck you,” Ryan says grumpily, and Brendon laughs. Down below, the music changes to David Bowie, and Ryan raises an eyebrow.

“Gerard interfered when I was making it,” Brendon informs him. “Said we had to stop practicing to the Beatles, or we’d get boring.”

“We don’t seem to be too boring for the audiences,” Ryan huffs, and elbows Brendon out of the way (he drops, hanging with his hands curled around the swing) so that Ryan can do a handstand, blinking down at Brendon, screwing up one eye when he accidentally blinks sweat into it. Brendon rolls his eyes.

“Take it easy,” he says. “You haven’t even warmed up yet. Safety first, Ross,” he adds primly, and Ryan stands upright properly and swings to the ladder, scales down and sits below Brendon so he can start his stretches.

“Good boy,” Brendon says, face open and amused, and Ryan yawns, pulling his leg behind his head.

“Show went well, last night,” he remarks.

“Uh-huh,” Brendon says. He flips around the swing in a slow circle, letting the momentum of coming down push him back up again. His worn, faded t-shirt falls halfway down his chest each time he goes up, baring smooth, pale stomach muscles. His voice has gone low, the way it does when he’s caught up in being on the trapeze. Brendon is one of the few acrobats Ryan knows who doesn’t ever get sick of being on the swings, how much work nearly every movement on it requires. It’s like flying, Brendon told Ryan when they first met, grinning madly. How could you ever get sick of it?

“Chicago, though,” Brendon adds after a while, as though he’s just remembered what city they’re in. “I think there’s a lot of family, here.”

It’s weird how after a while in the circus, you feel related to everyone. In different ways, of course – Gerard and Mikey are actually real brothers, whereas if Gabe and William thought of each other as brothers, well, that would be kind of gross – but in the end family is family, and it means that when Greta’s mom sits in the front row everyone beams and makes eye contact with her, and feels loved that she’s there.

“Anytime you’re ready, Ross,” Brendon drawls, hanging by his knees with his arms folded across his chest, and he gives Ryan an upside-down cross look, which fails to look anything but ridiculous. Ryan moves up smoothly to his feet, rolling his shoulders back, and scales the unsteady rope ladder again, jumping out across the gap to Brendon.

Brendon catches him.

*

Forty-five minutes before they’re meant to go on and Brendon can’t settle; Ryan watches out of the corner of his eye as Brendon restlessly picks things up from the dresser and then puts them back on, humming something jagged and frantic under his breath as he does so. Ryan thinks Spencer might just slap him if he doesn’t shut up soon, and that won’t be pretty, so he concentrates on doing his own stage make-up as fast as possible before going over to Brendon, curling a solid hand around his elbow.

Brendon blinks at him and offers up a distracted smile, and Ryan bites back the urge to sigh. Brendon’s done this too many times now to get stage fright, but sometimes he’ll have trouble putting himself in the headspace they need to be in before they go out and perform. Ryan tightens his grip and steers Brendon over to a chair, pushes him down in it. Brendon stares at him, all big eyes and eyelashes this close, bottom lip caught between his teeth.

“Hey,” Ryan says, and tilts Brendon’s chin up with his hand so that Brendon’s looking at his eyes, not a random spot on his chin where his overdramatic rouge is uneven. “Focus on me, okay? I’m right here.”

Brendon waits a beat and then nods, and Ryan shifts away long enough to grab his make-up. Brendon’s leg is jittering, knee bouncing up on down so Ryan sits on his knees and makes himself as heavy as he can, until Brendon settles into stillness. Then he does Brendon’s make-up, hand steady and cool against Brendon’s skin; the dark circles around his eyes, the flickering shadows out of eye shadow that make Brendon look shadowy and seductive. They’ve both got their roles to play; unfortunately, Ryan’s designated part is one that requires him to have make-up that makes him look permanently surprised, while Brendon gets the darkly handsome kind. Sometimes Ryan will complain about this, and Brendon will laugh at him, but tonight Ryan decides not to risk distracting him.

He moves quickly, does Brendon’s make-up as fast as he can, and Brendon’s eyes slip shut once Ryan’s done with the eyeliner. He breathes steadily, slow and even, and Ryan thinks he can practically see Brendon settling into his skin. He bites back a smile when he’s done and Brendon doesn’t move, just looks up and catches Spencer’s eye. Spencer laughs, bright and exhilarated; he’s tossing his two favourite balls from hand to hand absently, and Ryan thinks _yeah, he’s gonna be fine_.

“All done,” he says, standing back up, and Brendon opens his eyes and grins at him. He holds out a hand and Ryan clasps it, pulls him to his feet.

“Let’s do this,” Brendon says, and Ryan nods, moves closer. Brendon’s nose brushes against Ryan’s cheek when he leans forward to signal good luck at Greta, who is adjusting her feathers before she goes to fetch Smoky, and Ryan resists the urge to curl his hand in the side of Brendon’s shirt. It would only crumple his costume, Ryan knows; just, sometimes he forgets he doesn’t have to hold onto Brendon when they’re on the ground, for fear of falling.

*

It’s a good show. They’ve known each other for ten years, since they were both wide-eyed circus brats, and they’ve been working together for seven. Ryan thinks he knows the ins and outs of Brendon’s body as well as Brendon does by now, winces with Brendon when Brendon twists a little ungracefully, painful on the rib he broke two years ago (it’s been raining, so it aches).

Sometimes he loses track of the time in the air, so it’s just as well that he knows the act so well he doesn’t have to worry about forgetting when to start a new part. Gerard’s talking, he thinks dimly, calling out at their amazing feats, so he and Brendon are mostly still showing off. There’s always a bit like this to the beginning of each show – Gerard almost advertising their wares, before he steps out of the way, melts back into the shadows, and lets the scenarios take place.

Gerard’s a weird ringleader in lots of ways. He’s insistent on the idea that they be different, that they don’t present the same tired old acts as every other circus (“And no overly pretentious bullshit, either,” he inevitably adds, giggling a little. “We’re not the motherfucking Cirque du Soleil,”) and that means that he’s not the stereotypical ringleader. He wants them to be a little dangerous, a little off-centre, closer to hell than heaven. Usually at this stage he’ll launch back into the explanation of the name of the circus, and why The Black Parade is different, and _how_ it’s different, but Ryan’s heard the speech so many times now that he doesn’t even bother to listen.

The scenarios, though, they’re always fun. Stories within the story, Gerard says, ways to add up to the circus. Everyone has fun coming up with them, and everyone’s always willing to sit around and help think them out if you’re having trouble, but Brendon and Ryan usually come up with theirs on their own.

The current one is Ryan’s favourite, so far; they set up a really awkward blind date on the floor, miming out stilted conversations and embarrassing moments while twisting and contorting themselves into strange shapes at a tiny little dinner table, bumping heads deliberately more than once. After a few minutes, Brendon starts to try to escape the date by climbing up through the roof while Ryan feigns ignorance, and it changes from a show on the floor to a balancing act, and then to the trapeze. It always makes the audience laugh and gasp at the right moments, and at the very end, when Brendon’s hanging by his feet several metres above Ryan’s head, Ryan pretends to finally notice, face lifted up in faux shock, spotlight bright and burning his eyes. Brendon drops down in a sharp, controlled movement to press a warm kiss to Ryan’s mouth, and then he soars back up into the darkness and their part of the show is over.

They do it well, that night, and stumble off sweaty and laughing, brushing past a nervous Spencer (Spencer _always_ gets stage fright, even after all this time. It would be adorable, except for how snappish he gets). Ray greets them with a whispered “Good show”, his mouth close to Ryan’s ear (you have to be quiet, backstage, have to let the other performers get in the space they need). He adds, “You guys have to speak to a journalist after the show. Bob’s orders,” and they make a face at each other.

Brendon says that talking to people afterwards, explaining tricks and the amount of hard work that goes into shows “ruins the magic”. Ryan used to make fun of him for it, until Brendon got kind of drunk one night and tried to explain it, ended up just gesticulating dumbly at the stars and saying, “Because we’re the circus. Because – because we’re not meant to be _real_.”

Ryan just doesn’t like journalists.

*

They go out the back to wait for the show to finish, where it still looks like a construction zone: wooden boards and strewn hay and lots of manure from being so close to the animals. The noise of the show is still surprisingly loud behind them, Amanda’s low, husky voice as she twists onstage in her cabaret act following them out. Brendon puts his arm around Ryan’s neck and leans in close, breathing in Ryan’s ear. He is still a little out of breath and Ryan shrugs him off so he can do his stretches and warm down, let the tension uncoil from his limbs. It’s pretty unglamorous, but he knows from experience how sore he’ll be in the morning unless he does it, so he’s gotten used to it. He doesn’t have to look around to know that Brendon’s doing the same – absolutely everything on show nights has a routine.

The air out here smells of the circus, animals and sweat and popcorn and sawdust, but Ryan barely notices it anymore. He probably smells the same by now, anyway; he’s always careful to shower before he heads into town, into the clubs. Now, he takes in huge gulps of the sweet, cold air, face turned up to the sky. The stars are all out, the moon huge and harvest yellow, but his face is starting to itch from the paint so after a while he looks away and goes to join Brendon and scrub his face clean in a pail of cold water.

“This had better not be Smoky’s drinking water again,” Ryan warns, reaching forward to smudge off the thickened layers over Brendon’s eyebrows with cold fingers. “Or I’ll kill you in your sleep.”

“That was _one time_ ,” Brendon groans, half-laughing. “And Greta made her put you down after a while.”

“ _Kill you in your sleep_ ,” Ryan repeats, voice rising, and then glares. “Anyway, you try being carried around by an elephant _for a while_ and see if you recover from the shock.”

“No need,” Brendon says smugly. “Smoky likes me.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ryan sighs. “We all know. I think you’re a little too proud of it.”

Brendon laughs and sticks his finger through a hole in Ryan’s t-shirt, poking at Ryan’s ribs. Ryan bats him away with a warning scowl and leans over the bucket again, splashing water against his – mostly clean, now – face. He has a split second of warning when a warm hand curls around his neck, and then Brendon is shoving him down, dunking his entire head underwater. Ryan comes up spluttering and dripping all over his t-shirt.

“Asshole,” he spits while Brendon almost collapses with laughter, and then flings himself at Brendon, launching a quick and savage attack that ends with Brendon pinned beneath him, unable to move. “Ha,” he says triumphantly, and shakes his head, scattering droplets of water all over Brendon’s face.

“Mercy!” Brendon says, breathless from laughter and Ryan’s weight and Ryan rolls off of him, onto his back so that their shoulders are close and touching. They lie there quietly until the song that comes before the finale drifts out into the night air, and Brendon sighs.

“We’ve got to go talk to that journalist,” he says, and Ryan nods. “Come on, then.”

*

The journalist, it turns out, is a photographer. “The guy I usually work with is sick,” he explains cheerfully. “So if it’s okay with you, I’ll do the interview and then take a few photos, and Mike will write up the story later on.”

“Awesome,” Brendon says, and then hesitates a little awkwardly. It never fails to surprise Ryan to see Brendon looking uncomfortable, and it always makes him a little wary. If Brendon had the same expression during a routine, they would both be in a lot of trouble. “So, you know who we are…”

 

“Oh!” the photographer says, and turns a little pink in the cheek. He has a slight lisp; despite his better judgment and sweeping generalisations when it comes to outsiders (yeah, Ryan’s a snob who only likes certain people; no, he doesn’t really care) Ryan thinks he’s kind of adorable. “I’m Jon Walker, sorry. And – I really liked the show.”

“Thanks,” Brendon says, and flashes his biggest, brightest smile, the one he usually saves for Ryan after they’ve just gotten some new move down perfect, and Ryan knows he’s not the only one who thinks Jon Walker is kind of cute. He resists the urge to roll his eyes.

Jon’s nice, but the questions themselves are pretty ordinary – how long have they been in the circus, how long they’ve been working together, how they started in the first place. They give the same answers they give every time; glossing over family reactions (“I ran away and joined,” Ryan says with a tight smile, and before Jon can open his mouth and probe further Brendon adds, “Ryan’s pretty much our own personal Enid Blyton story,”; they don’t even go into Brendon’s past) and not talking for too long about their training processes (no one, they had discovered pretty early on, wanted to hear about the hours of work that go into an effortless looking routine).

It’s not even that unexpected when Jon bounces a nervous look between them and says, “So, you two have a pretty close – uh, physically, I mean – act, obviously, and you play out that date and then a kiss—”

Ryan sighs and shifts on the arm of Brendon’s chair, where he’s been sitting for the entire process. He turns his face to Brendon’s shoulder, resting his forehead on the bone and breathing out against the soft fabric of Brendon’s shirt. (It probably gives the wrong impression even more, but _every time_ , really. He gets kind of sick of it.) Brendon laughs with the right amount of cheerful surprise, as though it’s the first time he’s thought of something like that.

“We’re not fucking, if that’s what you’re asking,” Brendon says with the same almost-confidential, darkly amused tone he always uses when people ask that question. “We’ve known each other for – what now?”

He nudges Ryan and Ryan says automatically, slightly muffled into Brendon’s arm, “Nine years.” Brendon nods.

“Exactly,” he says. “And worked together for seven, and it’s like, we have to trust each other more than anyone else in the world because if not, we’re, you know, dead. You’ll see acrobats in some circuses and they’ll be on stage together and they’ll touch and sometimes it’ll _look_ like they’re holding each other up, but really they’re on their own, each responsible only for what happens to themselves. It’s easy to tell once you know what you’re looking for – one of them only ever catches the other one, or they’re both a little too concerned in stylistic little device thingies. And we didn’t ever want to be like that. So, yeah, we’re close. But, I think introducing a level other than friendship could ruin what we have.”

Ryan hums his agreement into Brendon’s shoulder and Brendon looks down at him with a flash of warm, palpable fondness before glancing back up at Jon and grinning wickedly. “Although,” he says, “Ryan was only sixteen when we started working together, and I was fifteen, so we’ve had a few embarrassing moments.” Ryan groans and Jon bursts out laughing, then stops the tape recorder.

“Thanks, guys, that was awesome,” he says, and Brendon unfolds himself from the chair, leaving Ryan to slump back on his own. The dressing room is small, Ryan thinks dryly, but probably Brendon doesn’t need to stand _that_ close to Jon.

“Shall we go take some pictures?” Jon asks.

“Let’s,” Brendon says, and links his arm through Jon’s, leading him into the ring.

*

This is the part of interviews that Ryan loves; wearing older, plain clothing (most photographers get the shots of them in their costumed finery during the actual show) and doing lazy, casually impressive moves up on the trapeze that are calculated to impress. Jon walks around below them, and Ryan moves as fluid and calm as he feels.

After a while, inevitably, he forgets about Jon back down there and his world narrows to Brendon and the swing. Up here, he knows, they are the centre of each other’s universes, tiny and self-contained as they are, like one of Spencer’s juggling balls cupped in the centre of his palm. He swings out into empty space and is certain of nothing more except Brendon’s reaching hands, waiting for him. They have not missed in years.

They swoop and fly towards each other in the low lights of the ring, and everything looks better from Ryan’s position, even the sawdust gleaming gold against the floor. Brendon looks incredible up high, beautiful and vivid and exotic, and Ryan will not be surprised when they come down and Jon stammers and turns red when Brendon leans in close. The next day, Brendon will be the one late to practice, with a cocky look in his eyes and a hickey on the side of his neck. Ryan will say, dryly, “Probably not the best idea to sleep with the media,” and Brendon will answer, straight-faced, “Yeah, he’s a little _too_ attached to his camera if you know what I mean,” and then they’ll be too busy giggling to practice properly for another half hour.

Up in the sky though, Brendon is all Ryan’s.

*

There’s never the same amount of people at the afternoon shows as there are at the evening ones. Ryan doesn’t quite get it; sure, there’s not as much _obvious_ magic about the circus in the plain light of day as there is at night, but there’s something more welcoming about it. You can see the chipped paint of the trailers, and sometimes you can catch a sneak peek of a performer putting on make-up or a costume through the dirty window. Gerard makes a point of leaning on the gate of the main entrance into the park so as to greet everyone who comes through in his tatty, beloved ringmaster’s coat, and Mikey and Pete wander the grounds as the mournful, silent clowns (the rest of the time, sadly, Pete never shuts up).

The circus seems more real during the three o’clock shows, Ryan supposes, and he likes feeling real. Anyway, once you get into the big tent it’s as dark as you need it to be.

Ryan waits for Spencer to get half-dressed (pinstriped trousers for the show on, but combined with a pair of sneakers and a casual t-shirt) before they head down to the performers’ area of the tent. Ryan demands a piggyback there and Spencer reluctantly gives in, with much grumbling about acrobats too used to not ever having to walk. There are people milling around the entrance and Ryan’s already done his make-up, so they point and stare and a few tentatively wave. Spencer grins and says, arms looped back around Ryan’s knees, “I’ve no free hands, sorry,” so Ryan waves for him, both hands and a crooked grin.

His smile fades though when he spots a familiar person waving back at him. He slumps down and Spencer says, “Hey, isn’t that the guy Brendon went off with last—”

“Yeah,” Ryan says resignedly, pressing his face against Spencer’s neck. “Yeah, I’ll talk to him.”

“Or else Gerard will get nervous and teary about broken hearts, and then Pete will get overexcited,” Spencer warns. “You know how it goes.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Ryan repeats, slipping off Spencer’s back and running ahead through the corridor on light feet. He turns around to shout a hasty good luck wish for the show over his shoulder to Spencer, only to see him already with Sisky and the Butcher, practicing handstands. Ryan bares his teeth in a grin and promptly slams into someone. “Ooof,” he says, surprised.

Brendon fists his hand in Ryan’s shirt automatically and steadies him, giggling a little weakly. “Woah, Ross,” he says. “Save your energy, dude.”

“I was looking for you,” Ryan says. Brendon waits and Ryan sighs, rubs his hands over his stubble. “Your boyfriend’s back,” he says finally, and Brendon looks blank, and then delighted, and then amused.

“Jon?” he asks, and laughs. “Dude, awesome. I didn’t think I’d ever see him again.”

“You that bad, Urie?” Ryan enquires, flashing his teeth in a smile, and Brendon punches him in the arm. Ryan rubs it and makes a face, and Brendon reaches forward and smoothes his fingers over it absently.

“Anyway, so what?” Brendon asks, and Ryan cocks an eyebrow at him. Brendon’s face shifts into a slightly mutinous expression; Ryan sticks out his hip (channelling Spencer) and Brendon pouts; Ryan leans in close and lets the tips of their noses touch, all while glaring fiercely at Brendon, and Brendon darts in fast and gives Ryan a butterfly kiss on his cheekbone, eyelashes fluttering against Ryan’s skin.

Ryan sighs and pulls back, shoulders sagging. “Fine,” he says. “You win.”

“You can’t trump the butterfly,” Brendon agrees. “Good effort, though. So, what’s up?”

“Just,” Ryan begins, and then looks at the floor. Brendon narrows his eyes.

“This isn’t going to be like when you thought Whatsherface was distracting me from practicing back in Boston, is it?” he demands. “Because I thought you were over that kind of dickishness—”

“No,” Ryan says quickly. “No, I am. Just. Brendon. We leave in a week.”

“Oh,” Brendon says, softening. He breathes out through the corner of his mouth and looks away. “Yeah. I know.”

“Just, be nice to him,” Ryan says. “I liked him. Don’t let it just… slip your mind.”

“Got it,” Brendon says, and slips under Ryan’s arm, hanging warm and steady around his shoulder. They tilt their heads together and Brendon nods, eyes dark and decisive. “Okay. Ready for the show?”

“Yeah,” Ryan says, and means, _always_.

*

Brendon spends every night with Jon that week, slinking back into the circus with an almost disconcerting intensity still lingering in his gaze, moving slow and deliberate and satisfied. Ryan laughs at him and Brendon looks back at him with a smile twitching in the corner of his mouth, and swings his hips a little exaggeratedly. He looks exhausted most of the time, but in a deeply contented way, so Ryan lets it slide.

Besides, he likes Jon a lot. Jon’s nice, and he looks at Brendon with this half-amused, half-delighted expression that makes Ryan grin, and he’s a lot nicer than some of the people Brendon’s hooked up with. Despite Brendon’s promises, actually, Ryan’s a little nervous the day they pack up, because Brendon’s late coming to help (and wow, Bob’s going to _kill_ him later; he hates it when people disappear in order to get out of packing the tents up. Ryan’s tried it once, and it’s so not worth it) and when he does show up, Jon’s trailing behind him.

They spend almost an hour standing close together and talking in low voices before Ray calls out, “Hey, Brendon, we really have to go!” and Brendon makes a face. Then he darts in close and kisses Jon almost sweetly, and Ryan turns away from the window of his trailer, feels like he’s snooping on something that he has no right to see.

A minute later, though, Brendon is pushing open the door to Ryan’s trailer and coming in. He grins at Ryan and then pushes open the window, leans all the way out as the engine starts up and they pull slowly out of the park, in a long line.

“Bye!” Brendon shouts, beaming. Jon yells something indistinguishable back and Brendon cracks up laughing. “We’re back in April!” he calls. “I’ll look you up! Come see the show!”

He stays half-out the window until they’re well out of sight of the park where they’d camped for the past week, and then Brendon pulls back from the window and slams the shutter down, shivering. It’s a cold day, the wind chilly and forceful enough to raise tears to their eyes, and Brendon’s teeth are chattering. Ryan rolls his eyes and thrusts a hoodie at him, and Brendon grins in thanks.

“Where’s Spencer?” he asks, pulling the hoodie over his head, and Ryan shrugs. Technically, it’s Ryan and Spencer’s trailer, but people are forever switching around, and it’s just as likely that Ryan and Spencer will be sharing the tiny couch while Vicky sleeps in Ryan’s bed and Mikey in Spencer’s one night, or Ryan will be crammed head-to-toe in his little single bed with William _and_ Gabe while Spencer gets his bed to himself, or one of countless other variations. Actually, the only person who _doesn’t_ spend the night in their trailer that often is Brendon, mostly because after they’ve worked together all day Brendon and Ryan need a break just from the other’s ever-constant presence. Sometimes, though, if Ryan’s having a shitty time sleeping and Spencer’s in a bad mood, he’ll go out into the night and slip into Brendon’s trailer, slide in next to him to sleep. They’re both pretty good at fitting in small spaces now. Basically: no one in the circus really gives a shit about which trailer belongs to who.

“I think he’s over with Patrick,” Ryan says. “He wants to talk about switching up his act, even though we’re already halfway through the tour.”

“Oh, the bottle thing, right?” Brendon asks. Ryan nods, and he winces sympathetically. Spencer keeps stuffing up this one part of his act, and even though he’s good enough that no one watching can tell, it apparently hurts his hand so much that he can’t enjoy the rest of the show.

Patrick isn’t technically one of the managers of the circus, but he’s really good friends with Bob, who is. Despite the fact that The Black Parade is, in name, Mikey and Gerard’s, Bob and Ray pretty much run it, and have since they joined (which was, according to anyone who vaguely remembers the event, a million billion years ago). Patrick continues to insist that he’s just the band conductor, but he’s capable of getting nearly anything you could want done. Ryan’s found it pays to be on good terms with Patrick.

Brendon sighs and flops down on the ground, blinks up at Ryan from his carpet with his head at Ryan’s feet. He looks upside down to Ryan, and when he pulls a face it looks ridiculous. Ryan looks down at him and bites his lip.

“Are you okay?” he asks finally, and Brendon’s smile widens.

“Fine,” he says.

“You’re not sad about—”

“It wasn’t serious, Ryan,” Brendon says, eyebrows shooting up the way they do when Brendon appears to worry his face has been still for too long. Ryan sighs and sits down on the floor next to him, then lies down awkwardly. It’s different if they can’t blink up at the night sky; down here, Ryan inevitably starts thinking about how on earth he and Spencer managed to get spaghetti sauce on the ceiling and whether or not he can be bothered repainting it, because it looks pretty gross with all the peeling paint and dubious stains and stuff. It’s not very conducive to getting Brendon to open up about his emotional pain.

“Every night’s kind of full on for something not that serious,” Ryan comments, and Brendon sighs and rolls onto his stomach. He reaches for Ryan’s remote and switches the crappy little TV on, propping his chin on his hands, his elbows on the floor.

“Yeah, well,” Brendon says, flipping through the channels until he finds a movie with Drew Barrymore in it. “Jon’s really fun.” He turns to Ryan slightly and leers, and Ryan laughs despite himself.

“Was Jon upset?” Ryan asks.

“Umn, not really,” Brendon says, distracted. “He was telling me that he’s got this kind of on-again off-again thing with this girl, Cassie, and he’s gonna try and get her back—”

“And you don’t _mind_?” Ryan asks, exasperated, rolling onto his stomach so he can peer at Brendon in what he hopes is a concerned, friendly kind of way. Brendon shoots him a startled, slightly confused look.

“Why would I?” he asks. “It’s not like I _love_ him. Jon’s nice, and Cassie sounds nice too, so. It’s all good.”

Ryan makes a face at the back of Brendon’s head when Brendon looks away; he _always_ manages to stumble onto the best, no-strings-attached relationships. It’s fucking unfair. Ryan inevitably ends up in fucked up ones, and he thinks he falls in love a bit too easily, even when he knows he always has a get out of jail free card what with the whole living in a constantly touring circus thing.

He sighs and makes one last effort to get a little bit of gossip out of Brendon. “Anyway,” he says kindly, “I bet you’re glad to get away from Chicago for a while?”

“I don’t really mind,” Brendon says, yawning against his fist. “Do you think Drew Barrymore’s this stupid in real life?”

“But like,” Ryan says, “You’re getting away from all the awkwardness and, uh, all the reminders of—”

Brendon looks at him mischievously, and starts singing. “Far away,” he intones, fluttering his eyelashes at Ryan. “The ship is taking me far away, far away from the memories—”

Ryan groans and buries his face in his arms. “Oh, you _suck_ ,” he says.

Brendon laughs and slings an arm around him, pushing his nose into the nape of Ryan’s neck and watching the movie. He sings into Ryan’s ear, absently, “Just wanted to hold you in my arms—”

Ryan’s neck starts to get stiff after a while, but he stays where he is. Brendon’s weird about seeking comfort, and it’s hard to tell when he’s doing it sometimes. Ryan’s gotten pretty good at staying still just in case.

*

The next lot of shows is in Indianapolis, which should be good – it’s not a bad city, from what Ryan can remember (though they all start to blur together in his head). The drive is pretty boring, though, like all drives are, and Ryan thinks somewhat longingly of the circuses without animals, the ones that are well-off enough now to get around by planes. He’s mumbling wistfully out loud something along these lines to Brendon, half-asleep while Brendon tries to remember the chord progression of an old song on Ryan’s acoustic, and Brendon nods in all the right places so Ryan decides to overlook the fact that he’s not listening.

He doesn’t really mind, as he’s not saying anything of much importance in the first place. He stops talking, yawns and stretches out and rests his head on as much as Brendon’s knee as he can get without bumping the guitar. Brendon is humming a melody that Ryan doesn’t recognise but after a while he makes a small, pleased sound and starts at the beginning, and Ryan guesses he’s gotten all the chords down right.

The movement of the trailer is kind of reassuring, and after a while Ryan drifts off to sleep. He wakes up when Brendon shifts, head bumping down on the ground, and he makes a small, displeased noise.

“You should go to your bunk,” Brendon half-whispers, kneeling over him. Ryan shakes his head blearily.

“I’m not really sleeping,” he says, and yawns, closing his eyes again. Brendon laughs softly.

“Oh, sure you’re not,” he says, and then he gets up. Ryan listens to his footsteps cross the room and then return, and then Brendon’s spreading a blanket over him. It’s Spencer’s, Ryan’s pretty sure; it smells like his shampoo, anyway.

Ryan reaches out and grabs onto Brendon’s sleeve. “Hey,” he says. “Thanks.”

Brendon winks at him and then stands up and shuffles away – probably, Ryan thinks dourly, to steal some of Ryan’s food while he has the opportunity. Ryan closes his eyes and falls asleep again.

*

The first night in a new city is always a bustle, trying to get the Big Top up before dark, rushing around in unfamiliar surroundings and tripping over things. Then there’s the catfights over who gets to use the practice space in the tent first, after a few days of not being able to practice properly for you. (“I need space!” Spencer yells, glowering. “What the fuck ever,” Ryan counters, glaring, “you’re a motherfucking _juggler_ , you don’t need anything to practice. _We_ need a – what’s it called again? Oh yeah, a goddamn trapeze!”)

The second day is the one where everyone gets their proper practice and stretches their legs again, and then that night is when they explore the city. Spencer heads off pretty early to catch a movie and get some dinner with Greta and Darren, and Ryan spots Pete, Patrick, William and Gabe going off towards the biggest mall they know with steely glint in their eyes. He’s just wondering whether he should go ask Andy if he wants to take some time out from his beloved horses to go see the new James Bond movie when Brendon appears out of nowhere and, grabbing his elbow, drags him back into the trailer.

“Get dressed,” Brendon says beaming, and thrusts a pair of Ryan’s tightest jeans and a black band t-shirt at him. “Come on, I want to go out.”

“Where are we going?” Ryan asks a little suspiciously, and Brendon makes an impatient noise at him and then turns around, staring at the wall as Ryan gets dressed.

“Dancing,” Brendon says triumphantly. “We haven’t been in _ages_.”

“Oh,” Ryan says, surprised. “Yeah, okay. Do you know anywhere?”

“I borrowed Suarez’s laptop,” Brendon says, nodding. “There’s a few okay sounding places.”

Ryan makes a pleased sound and grabs his jacket and off they go. Ryan likes going dancing with Brendon, likes that they know each other well enough now that they always look pretty impressive on the floor. It’s fun, too, and there’s enough of the performance about it that Ryan can enjoy himself without having to have the complete control over himself he does during a show.

The club Brendon picks out is already pretty busy and well on its way to getting to be full. They get a drink first at the bar, letting the mad rush of people slow down and slip under their skin. Ryan went seven years after he ran away without touching a drop of alcohol, but he doesn’t mind it that much now, as long as he doesn’t think about his dad. When he first started drinking, everyone treated him like glass, until one day he snapped and grabbed Brendon by the collar, shoved him up against the wall and said, “I’m not gonna turn out like him, okay?” which was somewhat ironic, considering it actually was something like what his father used to do.

All Brendon did was nod though, wide-eyed, and then he’d touched Ryan’s cheek with one long finger and a slightly regretful look in his eyes. After that, no one had said or acted any differently around Ryan drinking than they did anyone else, except to make fun of how much of a lightweight he was, and Ryan guessed that Brendon had said something to them. He couldn’t quite find it in him to get annoyed at Brendon’s big mouth, for once.

They finish their drinks and Brendon grabs Ryan’s hand, drags him to the floor. The DJ is pretty good and Ryan catches the beat, moves his hips exaggeratedly under Brendon’s hands. Brendon laughs and flicks his hair in an over the top kind of way, and then he gets distracted by something and the crowd pushes them apart. Ryan doesn’t mind that much; he’s got the feel of the music now and it’s okay without Brendon.

A girl with pretty brown hair that curls around her shoulders catches his eyes and moves hopefully towards him, and he steps closer to her, smiles wide and introduces himself. He has to bend low to catch her name over the noise and when she says, “I’m Lucy,” in his ear her mouth brushes his skin and he guesses that was her intention. He doesn’t really mind, though, and even finds himself considering it for a while – she’s very pretty, after all, and moves with enough self-assurance that Ryan thinks it’s probable that she’d be pretty hot under the slightly ridiculous outfit. He hasn’t hooked up in a long time, now that he thinks about it, just can’t be bothered with the awkward interaction that’s inevitably going to be involved at some point, and he deserves to let loose for a bit, after all.

After a few moments though he knows that he’s not going to, even though he doesn’t have any real reason not to. There’s something – he’s in a different kind of mood tonight, and there’s something humming in him, the desire to be pushed down, legs slung unceremoniously over someone’s shoulders. Usually when someone discovers that he’s in the circus they want to try a whole bunch of positions they’ve only ever seen in porn before, and Ryan would kind of like someone to do the work _for_ him for once.

He dances with Lucy anyway, because she’s nice and a pretty good dancer, and they move smoothly, back and force. People start watching them too after a while, grinning and nodding their heads in deference, and Lucy practically glows with all the attention (even if, Ryan thinks a little bitchily, he’s the one who’s really guiding them – all _she_ has to do is move her arms and follow his lead). Ryan grins down at her and moves forward, and then there’s a familiar hand on his hip and he turns around to meet Brendon’s eyes.

Brendon’s obviously been dancing too, and he’s slightly out of breath, skin hot to the touch. He grins and pushes forward, and it’s an obvious dare. Ryan rolls his eyes and lowers his head, says in Brendon’s ear, “What if I wanted to stay with that girl?”

“You need an equal,” Brendon says back, and then Ryan puts his hands on Brendon’s hips and they’re off, stalking across the floor.

Ryan wonders, sometimes, what it would be like to _not_ have a person like Brendon, someone so in tune with your body, someone who knows how it moves as well as you do. He knows it’s not a normal kind of relationship to have but still thinks that it would be awful not to have; that without Brendon, he’d feel the same as if he’d lost a limb or something.

They follow the beat of the song easily, Brendon’s hand around Ryan’s wrist and Ryan’s hands still firm, bracketing Brendon’s hips – he doesn’t want to lose Brendon again in the movement of the crowd, even though he knows they couldn’t now, knows that people are watching them and staring a little (“They’ve got to be professional – you can’t just _dance_ like that—”) and that they don’t have to worry about one of them being stolen away. Ryan can tell that Brendon’s had something else to drink, though; he moves just a little bit sloppily, enough for Ryan to notice, but his natural sense of rhythm stops it from showing too bad (which is good. If he made Ryan look like an idiot, Ryan might accidentally drop him in practice tomorrow).

They surge together, again and again, and soon Ryan’s out of breath and his skin feels like its buzzing. When he was an awkward, lonely teenager, still trying to master the trapeze, he felt like his skin never fit him properly, like it was maybe just a bit too tight and he could never get comfortable. It’s different now, whether he’s on the trapeze knowing exactly when he’s going to have to move to catch Brendon, or right here, too, wide-awake under the flashing lights of the club. Ryan moves and Brendon moves and their hips knock and press against each other, and if they did something like _this_ onstage they’d be thrown out by hundreds of appalled mothers. Brendon’s head falls forward a little and he breathes out, hot and harsh against the hollow of Ryan’s throat. Ryan takes a surprised, deep breath and knows that Brendon can see it and probably feel it. They are very close.

Ryan feels sharp and alive, under these lights, only the songs skip by a little too quickly for his liking. He’s maybe a bit too confident with the way he’s sliding against Brendon, too, with the way their skin brushes, and Brendon’s bottom lip is red from where he’s biting it. Ryan thinks for a moment about Jon and Jon’s questions and all the people before that; about Lucy left neglected in the crowd and how annoyed she’d be at Brendon; about Spencer, probably back in the trailer by now, and how he should probably apologise for their stupid little spat yesterday. He can’t quite bring himself to care about anything, though, and there’s a weird, vicious euphoria filling him up. They move.

*

They head home really late, around half past two in the morning, and Ryan just _knows_ that Bob’s going to find out and have some strict words to say to them about being so irresponsible the day before opening night. They haven’t had anything more to drink at least, Ryan thinks; they’re not _that_ stupid.

The cold night air is fresh on Ryan’s sweaty skin and he gulps in deep breaths of it, grateful for something to breathe that hasn’t already been inhaled by a hundred other moving people. Brendon tilts his head back and breathes in deeply, too, and Ryan grins at him. It takes Brendon a second to smile back, mouth a little uncertain in the corners. Ryan blinks at him and Brendon hails a cab.

They drive back to the park in mostly silence, Ryan thinking about tomorrow already (planning, calculating; they’ll have to be careful with that moment three minutes in, they’ve almost slipped the past few times – he’ll get Brendon to go over it with him a couple of times in a last minute rehearsal tomorrow – or maybe it’s got something to do with how quickly Patrick brings the music up then, maybe if they had a little bit longer to prepare, just a few seconds would be fine – he’ll talk to Patrick then, yes). Brendon starts to fall asleep – as inconspicuously as he can –against Ryan’s shoulder, and Ryan huffs out a breath, slings an arm around Brendon’s shoulders. Brendon blinks up at him and smiles, sinks further into Ryan’s ribcage.

“If you fall asleep I’m not carrying you again,” Ryan warns.

“Why not?” Brendon complains drowsily. “You carry me all the time.”

“Not when you’re asleep and a dead weight, I don’t,” Ryan says, and Brendon nods and turns his face so that his cold nose presses against Ryan’s collarbone. Ryan shivers despite himself.

“That was fun, tonight,” Brendon mumbles. “Though that girl hates me now—”

Ryan blinks at him for a moment, searching for a memory of a girl. “Lucy?” he asks finally, and Brendon nods, yawns against his skin.

“That’s the one,” he says. “I ruined her chance of a one night stand with the infamous—”

“I don’t know if it should be _in_ famous,” Ryan says. “I’m good in bed!”

“But I’m better with a pen,” Brendon whispers, and then giggles.

“Who said that?” Ryan demands. “Are you quoting Pete at me again? He’s a motherfucking _clown_ —”

“He says cool shit sometimes,” Brendon says. “Anyway. That girl was pissed at me, I’m just saying.”

“I wasn’t going to hook up with her anyway,” Ryan says dismissively, and pats at Brendon’s shoulder absently. Brendon makes a small, contented noise and wriggles closer and Ryan smoothes his hand in circles around as much of Brendon’s back as he can reach in the slightly awkward position. “We were just dancing.”

“You look better dancing with me,” Brendon says, voice husky with sleep.

Ryan hums agreement and then decides that that’s not an appropriate response. “How so?” he asks, but Brendon is already asleep.

He doesn’t wake up when they get back to the circus, either, and Ryan ends up having to carry him in after all. He cradles him in his arms and when he gets to his trailer the light’s on, and Spencer’s waiting to open the door with a book in his hand. They grin at each other, and Ryan knows he doesn’t have to worry about saying sorry for some stupid fight.

“Are you carrying Brendon over the threshold?” Spencer asks, sounding genuinely interested. Ryan shrugs as well as he can without dropping Brendon. Spencer says, “He’s not sleeping in my bed.”

“He can have mine,” Ryan says. “I’ll take the couch.”

He deposits Brendon in his bunk and goes off to brush his teeth. When he gets into the tiny bathroom he finds that he’s grinning a little stupidly at himself in the mirror. Whatever, it’s not like anybody with a heart _wouldn’t_ be amused at Brendon’s stupid, adorable little snuffly noises that he makes in his sleep.

Ryan sleeps uncomfortably on the couch. He dreams of flashing lights and a slight glimpse of bare, brown skin when a t-shirt rides up. He wakes up hard with a strange taste in his mouth.

*

As predicted, Bob goes off at them the next day. Brendon clearly had more to drink than Ryan noticed, because his eyes are red-rimmed and he winces every time Bob raises his voice (which is quite frequent, as they appear to have really pissed him off this time). Ryan slips him some aspirin when Bob pauses to catch his breath and Brendon shoots him a grateful look before going back to listening to Bob rail about irresponsibility and curfews being there for a reason.

Eventually, they’re told to go clean out the (always temporary) stables for Andy, and – with a weary tone in Bob’s voice – not to do it again. Bob glares menacingly at them to round it off and out of the corner of his eye Ryan sees Brendon’s lips twitching dangerously – it’s kind of hard to take Bob seriously when he spends most of his time giving Frank Iero piggybacks.

They head down to the stables after their practice and Ryan curls his lip, wondering how it’s managed to get this messy already. Andy laughs at them and hands them a pitchfork each before wandering off (and it’s sad, Ryan thinks, that they’ve done this often enough by now that Andy doesn’t even bother going through instructions. They’ve gotten better at restraining themselves from staying out too late now, anyway; during Ryan’s eighteenth year, Brendon went through his rebellious phase and it seemed like they spent every second day shovelling manure). Brendon puts his hands on his hips and surveys the mess grumpily.

Ryan glances at him, a little unreasonably annoyed. “Well,” he says, vengefully stabbing a forkful of dirty hay. “You owe me. Again.”

“What _for_?” Brendon asks, stopping to pick up an apple core and smacking Starlight lightly on the nose when she looks interested and tries to steal it from him. Starlight is Andy’s favourite horse (“Despite her horrible name,” Andy grumbles regularly, and casts a dark look at Gerard) and she’s judged by everyone to be the most intelligent, and she looks distinctly mournful when she gazes at Brendon. Brendon sighs and digs up a sugar cube from somewhere to feed her. It’s cute, but not cute enough for Ryan to let go of the argument.

“For helping you out,” he huffs, flexing his fingers around the stick he’s clutching. “Yet again.”

“Oh, yeah,” Brendon snaps. “Sorry about _forcing_ you to come out and go clubbing with me last night. Jesus, what kind of asshole _am_ I? How good of you to put up with me—”

“Shut up,” Ryan says, and they work in silence for nearly an hour. A little sweat prickles uncomfortably between Ryan’s collar and the back of his neck and the sun is bright through the open door, making him squint into the glare. Cleaning the stable is tedious, repetitive work and the manual labour involved in it is different to what Ryan’s used to and makes his back hurt. It’s worse when Brendon’s annoyed at him and refusing to talk, because then there really is nothing to do.

After a while, Ryan starts to make loud, impatient sighs because if Brendon’s going to be grumpy and sulk then he might as well do it in a way that amuses Ryan, and he usually does that by turning his face an interesting shade of red. Only a few sighs, with carefully calculated intervals, have Brendon glaring at the ground and clutching his pitchfork unnecessarily tightly, and after a while Greta and Vicky T run past the open door, barefoot and laughing. Ryan leans on his pitchfork, shields his eyes from the sun and makes a small, wistful noise.

“Jesus!” Brendon explodes. “I thought we were _shutting up_!”

“Make me,” Ryan says snidely. Brendon gapes at him.

“Did you just say that?” he asks incredulously. “Seriously? What, are you gonna stick your tongue out at me next?”

Ryan huffs and turns his back on Brendon, but a moment later there’s footsteps behind him, and Brendon is grabbing the back of his shirt and yanking it away from his skin. Ryan has a split second of flailing and opening his mouth to shriek and then Brendon _shoves a handful of hay_ down the back of his shirt.

Ryan turns around very slowly and stares at him. Brendon glares back but he takes a few involuntary steps backwards as Ryan advances forward. There are bits of hay dropping out the bottom of his t-shirt, and that’s probably ruining the perception of crazed-psychopath-about-to-murder-close-friend look he’s got going on right now, which is almost as annoying as the fact that Brendon’s apparently regressed a decade in maturity.

Brendon puts his hands out in front of himself and says, “Wait, wait. Okay, so I was just—”

“Just _what_?” Ryan growls and Brendon casts a desperate look over Ryan’s shoulder at the door. Then something goes bright and warm in his eyes, and Ryan casts him a look that he hopes is full of loathing at exactly the same time that Brendon starts giggling.

That’s pretty much an open declaration for war; Ryan stoops and scoops up two handfuls of hay and shoves them straight in Brendon’s face. Brendon chokes (wheezes out something like, “I inhaled them!”) and then lunges for an armful himself, showering it plentifully all over Ryan’s head.

And they’re off, Brendon cackling hysterically and rubbing handfuls into Ryan’s carefully styled hair, Ryan stuffing it liberally down Brendon’s pants. It’s undoubtedly a blessed thing that they’d mostly finished cleaning the stables before so that now it’s just clean hay that they’re tossing around (Ryan’s had horse manure in his hair before. He just doesn’t like to talk about it), and soon they’re red-faced and out of breath. Ryan is also very uncomfortable; the hay gets into awkward places and settles itself down, and then it _itches_.

He’s starting to win, though, backing Brendon slowly but surely into a corner and Brendon knows that he’s losing, is glancing around wildly for an opening. Ryan’s sure he has all his bases covered but maybe not, because Brendon finally lifts his face up to the ceiling, utters a crazy war cry and surges forward, tackling Ryan around the waist and knocking him to the ground. Ryan gasps, all the air knocked out of him and lies there for a second, flailing a little bit against the floor (because come on, that move was completely unfair), and Brendon moves to straddle him easily, beams down at him.

“Well,” Brendon says mock-thoughtfully, when Ryan’s stopped making outraged noises. “I think I won _that_ rather conclusively.” He pauses and then adds, curiously, “Although, when d’you think we wandered into a lesbian porn movie?”

Ryan goes back to making the outraged noises. Brendon waits patiently.

Finally, Ryan says, grumpily, “Get off me.”

“Why?” Brendon asks. “You’re pretty comfortable for someone so bony, dude.” He wriggles happily, as if to prove his point, but Brendon’s clearly forgotten that he’s straddling Ryan’s hips, and the rough friction of Brendon’s jeans against Ryan’s is weirdly good.

Ryan’s not even thinking; if he was, he’d be either amused or horrified at himself. As it is, he just goes still and lets his mouth fall open a little. He doesn’t arch up into Brendon’s touch or moan or do anything terribly embarrassing, let alone get hard, but maybe it’s too much just as it is, because Brendon stops and stares down at him. His eyes are wide and dark and Ryan lies back for a moment and meets Brendon’s eyes.

Then Brendon presses his hips down just slightly and Ryan props himself up on his elbows. They understand each other too well, Ryan thinks. “Brendon,” he says, voice steady. “Get off me.”

Brendon hops off pretty easily, stands up and dusts himself up and then offers a hand to pull Ryan up, too. They tidy up the mess they made pretty quietly, but mostly just because Brendon’s singing one of Spencer’s favourite songs – something by Spoon, Ryan’s pretty sure – and Ryan likes it when Brendon sings.

The show is good, that night.

*

It’s Mikey’s birthday, so they all sit around an illegal campfire and eat pizza and toast marshmallows. Pizza is always an interesting occasion when they order it as a huge group, because not only are there so many of them, there’s also steadfast vegans like Andy and Frank, and vegetarians like Gabe and Patrick, and sort-of vegetarians like Brendon, and then “normal eaters,” Ryan says smugly, and _then_ there’s Sisky, who refuses to eat pizza unless it has at least three different types of meat on it (and pineapple). As a result, there’s generally about twenty boxes to be found lying around at any given time, and they can only ever visit a pizza house once before they’re banned for life. They’re good business, though.

Ryan has his head in Spencer’s lap, and he’s half listening to Spencer and Tom argue about some book they’ve both read (Spencer thinks it’s brilliant, Tom thinks it’s pure shit) while trying to remember if he’s read the book himself so he can offer some kind of opinion. He can recall the characters, but none of the plot. After a while he tunes in to William on his other side, who is drowsily retelling some fairytale to Patrick and Pete, both listening with a strange amount of intentness.

Both conversations are distracting and loud enough that Ryan should be having trouble trying to process both of them and his own exhaustion (he didn’t sleep well, last night), let alone managing to wonder about anything else, but he’s keenly aware that he spends the whole evening tracking Brendon’s movements as well. He’s aware of Brendon when he’s practicing cartwheels with Ryland and one of the Alexes far away from the campfire, in the shadows; he’s listening when Brendon and Gerard sing softly, a punk song that Frank played non-stop for a month; he notices when Brendon sneaks off with Greta and a miraculously half-full box of pizza. He also notices that even though Brendon doesn’t seek Ryan out, he doesn’t avoid him either, and that this isn’t a big deal. That Ryan shouldn’t turn it into one.

Ryan wriggles back on Spencer’s lap, turns his head so that he’s breathing into Spencer’s denim clad thigh, and Spencer cards his hands absently through Ryan’s hair. Ryan doesn’t shiver and he doesn’t feel weird and prickly with heat like the other day in the stables. He wonders if maybe something horrible is going to happen, and he’s going to ruin his and Brendon’s working relationship, or their friendship. Two metres away from him, Brendon is leading the group in a rousing chorus of Happy Birthday To You.

*

Ryan thinks about it for a long time, which is weird because he’s not used to thinking about Brendon in such an intent, focused way; he’s used to Brendon being something constant, something he doesn’t have to worry about. A while ago, after his dad died, he went through a slightly (very) messed up phase where he felt like he didn’t deserve anything. Spencer had spent most of that time curled up next to his side, very forcibly reminding him that he wasn’t going anywhere, but Brendon had gotten _mad_. He’d been angry in a guilty sort of way, where he also felt awful that Ryan felt awful, but he’d been angry nevertheless, and one day he’d kind of exploded at Ryan, shouted at him for nearly ten minutes about Ryan being his _best friend_ and Brendon being sick of being treated like any second now Brendon was going to get bored of Ryan and wander off. He’d shouted until his voice cracked, and then he looked dangerously close to tears, and Ryan had said sorry and asked if he wanted to watch a movie with him. Brendon had curled around him and not moved for nearly twelve hours.

Brendon is this presence who’s always there, who Ryan _knows_ will be there. It’s not as if Brendon doesn’t surprise him, and it’s different from an overly reliable, boring kind of thing because Brendon constantly catches him off guard with his spontaneity, but Ryan knows now that there’s some friendships he’d been pretty sure he could never mess up, no matter what kind of an asshole he turned into. Spencer was one of those, and Gerard, who took him in when he was a scared, fucked up kid, and up until now he’d been sure Brendon was one of those, too. Ryan shouldn’t be thinking about dumb stuff like this, shouldn’t be considering possibilities that could have such a disastrous effect.

Brendon’s eyes had been very dark when he settled on Ryan’s hips, and his hands had twitched a little uncertainly, as though unsure where to rest.

Finally Ryan gets bored of being confused and heads out to the trapeze. He and Brendon have already practiced that morning, but he hears _Here Comes The Sun_ coming from the tent and grins a little sheepishly, realises that Brendon has had the same idea.

In the tent, Brendon is swinging slowly, completing easy turns up on the swing, but his shirt is damp with sweat, his hair sticking to his face, so Ryan guesses he’s been doing a pretty demanding practice already. When he spots Ryan, Brendon smiles and drops to the floor.

“Hey,” he says, wincing when he lands a little heavily on the balls of his feet. “What’s up?”

“Not much,” Ryan says, leaning back against the barrier that separates the ring from the first row of seats. “You’ll be all tired out this afternoon if you work too much today.”

“And I guess you were just coming down to admire the sawdust?” Brendon asks, drawing closer, and Ryan laughs. Brendon hesitates for a moment and Ryan tries not to blanch. He doesn’t _want_ things to be weird. He can’t think of anything to say, though, so he just tilts his head and hums along, _and I say, it’s all right_.

Brendon says, “You know, this was the first song I learned on guitar?”

“Really?” Ryan asks, slightly curious. It’s not often that he learns something entirely new about Brendon’s past.

Brendon nods. “With my dad,” he says. “It’s one of my earliest memories. Sitting on the porch learning this song.” And oh, Ryan thinks, Brendon’s dad. That’s why he hasn’t heard this story before.

He slings an arm around Brendon’s shoulder and Brendon hums, turns his face slightly so that he can press it, sweaty and hot, against Ryan’s neck. And this is – this feels normal, this feels real. Ryan releases a breath and they stand very still together for a moment, Brendon warm against his side. Ryan thinks about all the confusion of the past few days and realises, with strange simplicity, that he doesn’t want it. This is enough.

Brendon looks up at him, though, and his eyes are dark again, that sense of purpose in them that Ryan recognises, but has only ever had directed at him, once. He pauses and then shifts slightly, infinitesimally, so that their faces are close together. Ryan’s made a decision, but the breath he draws in feels weirdly shaky, and when he speaks he’s dismayed to find that his voice is a little unsteady.

“Brendon,” he says. “Don’t.”

Brendon releases a breath and then smiles a little crookedly, eyes warm. “Okay,” he says, and presses a kiss to Ryan’s cheek and then settles back against his shoulder. Ryan bumps their hips together, and feels happy.

*

They go out one day, Brendon and Ryan and Spencer and Greta and Amanda and Patrick. Most of them are wearing casual clothes, but Amanda’s idea of casual clothes differs slightly to everybody else’s (the concept of when it is appropriate to wear a corset in particular), and Ryan insists on wearing his scarves and his hat and his pointy shoes, so they attract a fair bit of notice. Amanda’s packed a picnic in a wicker basket, and she and Patrick swing it, while Greta sings old songs, quiet hymns that aren’t about religion as much as they are feeling loved. The sun is warm on their heads, and Ryan tilts the brim of his hat down slightly against the glare. Brendon grins at him and makes an idle remark about Ryan looking very rakish today, and then looks pleased that he’s worked that word into conversation.

They head down to the river, a gentle, green slope that leads down away from the busy roads. Greta and Patrick spread out the picnic rug and smooth out the corners. They sprawl out across the blanket and Brendon takes his acoustic guitar off from his shoulder and plays accompaniment to Greta’s singing. He doesn’t know the songs she started with, so they compromise and switch to the latest terrible Top 40 hits, singing sugary sweet and batting their eyelashes at the others. Ryan sprawls on his stomach and shares watermelon with Spencer, licking off the juice that drips onto his hands. Brendon’s smile is open and real and Ryan thinks _yeah, we did the right thing_.

“So,” Patrick says after a while, smoothing over a frayed part of the chequered rug. “Ohio tomorrow.”

“Oh, God,” Greta sighs. “More driving. Don’t remind me. Smoky’s getting to the stage where she gets grumpy every time.”

“Can’t be that much fun,” Amanda drawls. “What with the whole being a humongous elephant thing.”

Greta smiles tightly at her from under her floppy straw hat and says, “Honey, _I’m_ the one who has to spend half the ride in there with her.”

“New York soon,” Brendon declares, and the group brightens. New York is always one of the best places to visit, and Ryan thinks vaguely that maybe he can find someone there. His last serious girlfriend was from New York, anyway, and that had even lasted a while, seven long months before she got tired of waiting. He doesn’t really blame her. She was nice, though; maybe he’ll look her up when they’re in town, see if she wants to catch up. He doesn’t even have any ulterior motives.

Brendon puts his guitar aside and says, “I’m so fucking _tired_.” There are a few mumbled agreements, and Ryan nods; they’re almost constantly on the move, and Ryan can’t remember the last time they were in Vegas. He has his own apartment there, now, can finally afford it, but mostly he and Brendon still crash with Spencer. Brendon hasn’t even bothered to get a new apartment. For a long time, Ryan knows, it was because he was still waiting, still hoping; now it’s just habit.

Brendon yawns loudly in Ryan’s ear and Ryan tilts his head and opens his eyes from where his face is resting on his folded arms to see that Brendon’s stretched out beside him. Ryan hums something soft and welcoming and Brendon pushes his nose against the inside of Ryan’s elbow. His eyelids look heavy, bags deep under his eyes, and Ryan decides that he should sleep in Brendon and Tom’s trailer tonight, make sure that Brendon’s sleeping properly. Opening night in Columbus will suck if Brendon’s sleep deprived.

After a while, Ryan falls asleep. The sun is warm and he’s comfortable with Brendon dozing next to him. He wakes up to Patrick’s voice, telling them all that they’d better get a move on and head back in time to pack up the tent, that they were only meant to be gone for a few hours and that it’s already pushing three. Ryan tilts his head and opens his eyes to tell Patrick to relax a bit, but Patrick is looking at him in a fond kind of way, gaze drifting from Ryan to Brendon asleep with his face pressed against Ryan’s chest, and Ryan doesn’t say anything at all.

“Yeah,” he says instead, stretching and yawning. “Come on, Brendon. Wake up.” Brendon stirs and blinks up at him and Ryan says, “You can sleep tonight. Time to go back, come on.”

“Home?” Brendon asks dopily, voice bleary with sleep.

“Not just yet,” Ryan says.

*

They make good time travelling and arrive in Columbus a day earlier than planned. They set up as quickly as possible, unused to the novelty of being ready this early, and by the time night falls the Big Top is up. A whole group of them hang around inside it, while Bob experiments with potentially different lighting. They do handstands and cartwheels in the ring and share a few bottles of red wine (there’s a lot of them to spread the alcohol out, but after the first bottle Gerard bans the trapeze, just in case). Ryan and Brendon show off, doing back flips completely in synch with each other, until Greta threatens to bring in Smoky if they’re being competitive and squash their pride with a few cartwheels on her broad back. Greta will do it, too, so Ryan grins and slides to the floor, lies half propped up against the edge of the ring and heartlessly refuses Frank’s challenges for an arm wrestle.

After a while, Bob signs something at Gerard and Gerard sighs, sidles over to Ryan. “Hey,” he says, “You’re not drunk, right?”

“What?” Ryan asks, trying to decide whether to be indignant or not. “No, I’m not.”

“Yeah, didn’t think so,” Gerard says. “Hey, there’s a few people hanging around the outside of the tent – can you go and tell them opening night’s not until tomorrow?”

“They can’t read the signs?” Ryan asks, annoyed, and Gerard shrugs.

“There’s always a few,” he says, and Ryan nods, pulls himself to his feet. Gerard sits down in his newly vacated spot and curls an arm around Frank, and Ryan leaves to the sound of half the circus making gagging noises at a giggling Gerard.

The group lingering around outside are three adults, which is a surprise, because usually it’s the soccer moms with spoiled kids who want a sneak preview of the circus. Ryan stands in the shadow of the tent and calls, “Hey, guys? Circus doesn’t open until tomorrow. We’ll see you then!”

One of the people steps forward and says, “We’re not – we’re looking for one of the performers,” and Ryan steps closer, furrows his brow. He’s pretty sure no one has family in Ohio, because word spreads quickly and the family comes down early, anyway, not in the cover of dark. This could possibly be a jilted lover plus friends from the last time they passed through – it’s happened before, and it’s not pretty.

Then the woman steps into the light and Ryan revaluates, because she looks too old, like she’s in her fifties, and there’s a gold wedding ring on her hand. The man steps up too, and he’s got his arm around her, so Ryan guesses they’re married. They also look… weirdly familiar. Ryan blinks   
at them and tries to place where he’s seen them before. Features jump out at him – the woman’s full mouth, the man’s eyes.

“Do you know Brendon Urie?” the woman asks, and her voice is shaking a little, and Ryan gets it. His mouth falls open and he stares at them, curls his hands across his stomach. He can feel them shaking against his t-shirt and he stares in wonder at these people because, yeah, he knows exactly who they are. He’s seen them before, too, indistinct shadows moving behind windows while Brendon stood at the door of their suburban house and rang the doorbell, looking small and young and frightened. Ryan had come with him every time Brendon had tried to reunite with his family, whenever the circus passed through Vegas. The first two times, Brendon had knocked on the door and been turned away without ceremony by a long, lean figure; the third time, he’d been told by a stranger that the Urie family had moved away. No, he didn’t know where they were living now.

Ryan doesn’t know whether he should run away or punch these people in the face. Instead, he says, voice as even as he can make it, “I’m Ryan Ross. Who are you?”

The woman bites her lip and says, “I’m Sarah Urie. I’m Brendon’s mom. This is Paul, his dad, and Kara, his sister.”

“Okay,” Ryan says. “What do you want?”

“To see Brendon,” Brendon’s mom says a little desperately. “To—”

“Yeah,” Ryan drawls a little lazily, and tilts his head back to the sky. “And why the fuck d’you think I’m gonna let you do that?”

Brendon’s dad makes a small, growly noise in the back of his throat and steps closer to Ryan. “Now, look, son,” he begins, and Ryan glares at him.

“Don’t call me that,” he says. “I wouldn’t call Brendon that either, if I were you. I don’t think he’d like it very much. He’s probably had enough of hypocrisy by now.”

There’s a small, distressed noise from one of the girls and Ryan opens his mouth – he doesn’t know what he’s going to say, maybe to yell, maybe to ask them, very politely, to please go away – when there’s the sound of laughter rising up towards them and Brendon calls, voice getting closer, “Ross, how fucking long does it take, seriously? Come on, Ryland just dared Pete to—”

He stops short and Ryan feels Brendon’s warmth against his back. He turns around and curls his hand around Brendon’s wrist, whispers, “I’m sorry. I thought I’d have time to tell you—”

“Brendon?” Brendon’s mom says, and her voice cracks. Brendon’s face has gone white and Ryan steps closer to him, soothes his fingers over Brendon’s fast-beating pulse.

In the doorway leading into the tent, Gerard appears and Ryan meets his gaze over Brendon’s shoulder, breathes out in relief. Gerard walks up quickly, smiling politely, and Ryan guesses that he’s heard and seen enough to know what’s going on. Gerard’s always been pretty intuitive in situations like this, and Ryan has never been so proud and glad of him in his life, never been so full of gratitude for how well Gerard looks after his circus. It’s easy, in moments like this, to remember why most of the people in The Black Parade would follow Gerard off a cliff.

“Hello,” Gerard says, cheerfully. “You guys have actually come at a bad time, right now. We’re doing a bit of rehearsing, so I’m going to have to ask that you come back tomorrow.”

Brendon’s mom starts to cry, turning her face towards his dad’s shoulder, and Kara steps forward for the first time. “Please,” she says. “Can’t we just talk to Brendon for a little while—”

Gerard turns to Brendon and Ryan’s grip on his wrist tightens. Brendon takes a deep breath and says, “You should come back tomorrow.”

“Brendon—” his father begins, and there’s this note of steel in his voice that makes Ryan furious, makes him want to shout _you can’t boss him around anymore, you can’t tell him what to do_.

Brendon doesn’t need Ryan to, though. “You should come back tomorrow,” he repeats, voice firm. “I’ll speak to you then.”

Then he rearranges Ryan’s grip so that they’re holding hands and turns around and marches past his family towards the trailers.

*

There’s no real question that night as to where Brendon will stay, so Ryan doesn’t even bother going past Brendon’s trailer. They go straight up into Ryan’s, and Ryan says, “Brendon—”

“I’m just going to brush my teeth,” Brendon says, and goes and does so. Ryan goes and gets into a worn pair of track pants and a t-shirt, and then he waits outside the door of the tiny bathroom. Brendon gives him an unreadable look when he comes out, a little bit of dried toothpaste in the corner of his mouth, and when Ryan opens his mouth Brendon puts his hand on Ryan’s arm and says, “Now you.”

Ryan sighs but goes in and uses the toilet, brushes his teeth as well. When he comes out, Brendon’s already curled up in Ryan’s bed with the light turned off, and Ryan hesitates for a moment before sliding in next to him. Brendon’s wearing his boxers and one of Ryan’s old t-shirts, Ryan realises, and he waits for a moment longer and then, when Brendon doesn’t volunteer any conversation, slips an arm around Brendon’s waist.

Brendon makes a small, gasping noise and turns around, clenches his hands in Ryan’s t-shirt. “Why did they do that?” he asks, and his voice is trembling. Ryan tilts his head down, until it’s resting against Brendon’s, his breath stirring the hairs on Brendon’s head.

“I don’t know,” he says. “Why are they even in Ohio?”

“I don’t _know_ ,” Brendon says a little hysterically, and then gulps in air convulsively, like he can’t quite get enough. Ryan rubs his hand in slow, big circles on Brendon’s back and Brendon sobs with dry eyes, straining for air. Ryan hums the most comforting songs he knows and Brendon’s grip on his shirt loosens slowly but surely, until eventually his hands are just there, warm and firm against Ryan’s chest.

“Go to sleep,” Ryan whispers, and Brendon nods. Ryan expects that they’ll both be awake for ages, but Brendon falls asleep pretty quickly and Ryan a matter of minutes after him.

He wakes up the next morning with Brendon warm around him, still, and a polaroid of them curled up together taped to his forehead (with a note on the back that says, “maybe it’ll cheer him up????? or maybe you’re both just idiots” in Spencer’s handwriting that Ryan ignores). He thinks, _opening night_ , thinks, _Brendon_ , thinks, _fuck_.

*

Brendon talks to his family again for the first time in a decade sitting at a picnic table near the Big Top. They sit on opposite sides, Brendon’s mom, dad and sister on one and Brendon on the other, and Brendon drinks circus coffee and doesn’t offer them any. Ryan lingers a little way away and tries to listen to their conversation without making it clear that that’s what he’s doing. After about half an hour, Brendon stands up. His family stands up, too; his mom looks like she’s going to start crying again.

“I guess I’ll see you tonight,” Brendon says. His dad nods.

“We’ll look forward to it,” his mom says, her voice strained. “It will be wonderful to see what you’ve made of yourself, Brendon. You already look so different.”

Brendon puts his hands in his pockets and looks tired. “Did you expect me to still be thirteen?” he asks, and then turns and walks to Ryan. Ryan slings an arm around his shoulders and Brendon leans into him.

“You want to talk about it?” Ryan murmurs, aware that Brendon’s family is watching them go.

“Sure,” Brendon says, and he sounds _exhausted_. “But let’s go practice for a while, first.”

*

They go through textbook stuff for a while (or, well, as textbook as they get) and then slide into a half-hearted run through of the routine, minus the over-the-top acting that’s part of it. Brendon does go through with the kiss, though, although Ryan’s not expecting it so they bump their foreheads together and that makes Brendon drop to the floor and swear in a low, annoyed voice. He keeps cursing way past his usual time limit and Ryan sits down besides him, waits for it to subside.

“Done?” he asks finally, and Brendon takes a breath, nods.

“I can’t,” he says slowly, and then stops. “The fucking – I can’t believe how fucking _arrogant_ they are, to think they could just, just waltz back in and be part of my life again—”

“Yeah,” Ryan agrees softly, and then hesitates before continuing. “But they did, Brendon. And they’re here now. So what are you going to do?”

“I want to never speak to them again,” Brendon says, and then laughs low and ugly. “But I mean… until I was twenty I would have killed for them to contact me. So I guess I’ll get back in contact with them. I just don’t – I think they’re gonna try and make me come back properly to them, and join the Church again, and I can’t – I can’t—”

“You don’t have to,” Ryan says fiercely, and curves his hand around Brendon’s cheek, tugs him close enough that he can press a warm kiss against Brendon’s cheekbone. “They can’t make you do _anything_ you don’t want to. Okay?”

“Yeah,” Brendon says, and he still looks tired and unhappy but some of the tension melts out of his body. He leans closer to Ryan, says, “They’re coming to the show tonight. We’ll probably disgust them with our act, anyway.”

“Shit,” Ryan says. “Yeah. I hadn’t thought of that. They’re not gonna be that happy with you kissing me, huh?”

“Fuck them,” Brendon says softly, but Ryan shakes his head.

“Maybe,” he says tentatively, “Maybe we should do an old act. Just for tonight. Not because you’re pandering to them, but just – to give them a chance to get to know you again, before you shock them. You know?”

Brendon looks at him, eyes soft, and his mouth twitches. “Did you just say ‘pandering’?” he asks, and Ryan grins.

“We could do the old routine,” he suggests. “The one we did before. You know, with Amanda?”

“Oh,” Brendon says, eyes mischievous, “Because they’re going to get pissed off about a kiss, but they’re not going to mind you and me doing an act to Amanda singing Coin Operated Boy?”

“It’s just a suggestion,” Ryan says, and okay, whatever, he likes that song. Amanda writes good songs, and it was fun performing it, too; Brendon hanging limp and unalive from the trapeze at first, and then whirling out into new acts, higher and higher and higher. Ryan had pretended to be building him at one point, and it had looked awesome, their bodies twisting into strange shapes and casting shadows down on the ground. Still, he can see Brendon’s point; probably the line _I will never leave my bedroom_ wouldn’t give the best impression.

“Okay, then,” he says. “What about the one before that? What about the ‘have you ever had that dream…’ routine?”

Brendon snorts. Ryan sees his point.

“Well,” he says, trying to remember. “What did we do before _that_ one?”

Brendon looks at him with the face that means he’s trying very hard not to laugh. “That would be the one we did for Gerard’s birthday tour,” he says. “To Idiot Boyfriend, by Jimmy Fallon.”

Ryan meets his gaze and sighs mournfully, but he can feel his mouth twitching. “We’re not very good at doing acts that don’t have a lot of homoerotic tension in them, huh?” he enquires, and Brendon bursts out laughing.

“We’re definitely giving Gerard a run for his money,” Brendon gasps out finally, and Ryan bristles because, okay, whatever, making out with Frank Iero on such a regular basis that you can’t even keep it in your pants onstage does not constitute proper unresolved sexual tension. He informs Brendon as such and Brendon nods but also doesn’t stop laughing, so Ryan’s not really sure _who_ won that argument. He counts it as his win, anyway, if only because Brendon’s stopped looking quite so sad.

*

Ryan takes a long time doing Brendon’s make-up that night, leans in close and keeps his hand as steady as he can. Brendon keeps his eyes closed and breathes slow and steady, leans back in his chair and doesn’t rattle his leg on the ground like he does when he’s nervous or upset, but he’s clenching the arms of the chair hard, fingers flexing white every now and then. Ryan is very careful, but he keeps getting distracted by the roar of the crowd, thinking of Brendon’s family sitting faceless in the dark.

He’s nervous, properly nervous for the first time in years. He doesn’t know what Brendon’s thinking or feeling and that freaks him out a little more than he would have expected; Ryan likes things to be reliable. They’re always on the move, places are always different and the audience is always changing and Ryan’s gotten kind of used to Brendon being a constant, and part of that is understanding Brendon.

“There,” he says, standing up, and Brendon opens his eyes. He looks tired, more than anything, and that doesn’t really do anything to soothe Ryan’s nerves – he _needs_ Brendon to be awake, to be alert. He reaches out and grabs Brendon’s elbow when he goes to sidle past, tugs him back gently and meets his eyes squarely. “Hey,” he says. “You gonna be okay?”

“It’s just my mom, Ryan,” Brendon says, and shrugs his shoulders. He looks at the ground and repeats, “It’s just my mom.”

“It’s not _just_ your mom,” Ryan argues. He knows that Brendon doesn’t mean it like his dad and sister aren’t there, but he doesn’t think Brendon’s right in the other context either. Much as he wants Brendon to be alright for the show, he’s not sure lying about things is the best way to go.

“It kind of is,” Brendon says.

They go out together and Ryan feels terrified. He thanks god that he doesn’t sweat, because he’s not sure the chalked palms of his hands would be able to withstand it if he did. Instead he closes his eyes and scales the rope ladder quickly as he can, Gerard’s voice booming down below them. Gerard sounds indistinct, though, blocked out by the buzzing in Ryan’s ears.

The clash of Brian’s cymbal sounds through the ring and Brendon is falling towards Ryan, turning easy somersaults through the air. Ryan reaches out his hands and Brendon catches them easily, and they’re off, they’re flying. Ryan’s world flashes bright before his eyes and then stills, to Brendon’s waiting hands and smile.

*

They come off laughing and breathless, and Ryan has the unaccountable feeling that he’s gotten away with something. He tells Brendon so and Brendon laughs, hugs him close and smacks a loud, wet kiss on Ryan’s cheek, making Ryan scowl and shove him off. They get outside to warm down and wash their faces and Brendon does four exhilarated cartwheels in a row.

“I fucking showed _them_ ,” he says.

“Best night of the tour,” Ryan declares, and then Brendon has his hands and they’re spinning around, and Ryan feels stupid and teenage again, head whirling and stomach dropping, crazy happy and feeling like his world begins where Brendon’s hands are gripping his.

And that’s – that’s a little ridiculous, so Ryan breaks their grasp and flops to the ground, out of breath. “Jesus,” he says, meaninglessly.

“Yeah, my mom thinks he’s pretty rad,” Brendon says absently, and then they’re both killing themselves laughing again, pressing their faces into their arms to muffle it.

Ryan says, “You gonna go talk to them afterwards?” and Brendon nods, bright eyed.

“Yeah,” he says. “They go back to Vegas tomorrow, apparently. They’re in Columbus visiting some old friend who’s sick.”

“They couldn’t stay a little bit longer?” Ryan asks, frowning. “Why did they come find you, if only for a few days?”

Brendon shrugs. “I think it was a spur of the moment thing,” he says. “And, you know, they’re obsessive compulsive about plans. It’d kill them to reschedule a plane flight. It’s kind of – they want me to meet up with them again in Vegas. It’s not like this is the last time.”

“Are you going to, do you think?” Ryan asks, and Brendon tilts his face up to the sky, considering.

“Yeah,” he says finally. “Yeah, probably. I don’t know if – if I’ll ever forgive them? But I love them. So.”

Ryan closes his eyes and rolls closer to Brendon, Brendon’s weight warm and solid against his side. “After everything?” he asks, quietly. “You can still love them, after what they did?”

“They’re my family,” Brendon says.

Ryan nods. “It’s just,” he says. “I guess, I guess you’re more forgiving than me.” He pauses and then adds, “I’m not sure I could still, after all this time. It’s – it’s good that you do.”

“Could still love them?” Brendon repeats, sounding slightly confused, and Ryan nods again. Brendon shifts slightly, onto his side, so that he’s speaking into Ryan’s shoulder. He asks, low and uncertain, “Are we still talking about my family?”

“Ten years is a long time,” Ryan says.

“Yeah, Ryan,” Brendon agrees. “It is.”

They fall silent and Ryan keeps his eyes closed, Brendon’s breath warm as it fans out against his neck. After a while, the sound of the finale drifts out and Brendon says, “I have to go meet them.”

“I’ll come with you,” Ryan says, and it’s firm but he feels tenuous, like his grip on things is shaky. It’s a question, and he knows it, and Brendon knows it.

“Thanks,” Brendon says. “That’d be good.”

*

Brendon’s mom and dad beam when they see Brendon, clutch him in huge hugs and start babbling about how amazing he was, how they had no idea he could _do_ things like that, what about that back flip? And the jump! And the bit where he was hanging by one foot and still managing to catch Ryan! They turn to Ryan, too, enthuse about how _good_ they were together, how beautiful they looked up there, how _funny_ it was. Ryan’s surprised by that bit, how Brendon’s mom bursts out laughing when recalling Ryan’s “surprised little face!” and how Brendon’s dad grins, looks proud, asks whose idea the story was. Only Kara looks at Ryan oddly, a slight darkness in her eyes. Ryan raises his chin defiantly and glares slightly, and Kara looks away first.

Brendon starts smiling almost immediately, and as they keep talking he starts to unfold, uncrossing his arms and gesturing as he talks, even stepping in closer to them to touch. Ryan watches as Brendon’s parents stare back at him with this immense fucking sense of gratitude and love and doesn’t know whether to feel sick or happy, settles for something in between (contradictory as it is). Brendon looks happy, though; Brendon looks happy and he looks _good_ with them, too. Some families, Ryan thinks, you just look at them and they fit together and you can see the love (even after ten years). He and his dad were never like that, too used already to watching people leave, too busy wondering which one of _them_ would be the first to go. Ryan’s dad dealt with things in a bad way, Ryan knows, and a thirteen year old shouldn’t have to put up with an alcoholic and all the shitty things that happens, and he’s never, ever going to regret joining the circus, but sometimes it makes him feel awful, that it ended up being him that left.

He tunes back into the conversation going on when he realises how late it is, how the rest of the crowd has disappeared and the performers are walking freely around the grounds again, in a mixture of stage make up and casual clothes. Kara is talking about her husband and kids back in Vegas, how much she wants Brendon to meet them. Brendon is smiling, like he can’t quite believe that there’s still a family waiting back for him there, but he also looks kind of sad, kind of wistful. Ryan puts a hand on Brendon’s shoulder and Brendon leans into it just slightly, just for a moment.

He says, “Well, I’m not sure when we’re back in Vegas – not for a while, not for at least another four or five months, but—”

“Brendon,” his mom says suddenly, and she looks nervous and excited. “Honey, what if you didn’t come back then? What if you came back _now_?”

Brendon laughs. “Mom,” he says. “We’re in the middle of a tour. I can’t just take a week off to come and visit—”

“We’re not talking about taking a week off,” his dad says, and something black and awful curls in Ryan’s stomach, slides up into his throat and squeezes it tight. “We’re talking about coming back for good. Brendon. Leave the circus, and come home with us.”

Brendon’s smile fades slowly, like he’s still waiting for the punch line, and he looks uneasily at each of their faces. They look serious and kind and loving, like a _family_ , and Ryan feels sick, he wants to punch them, wants to cause as much hurt as he can and say _don’t you dare, don’t you dare take him away from me, he is all I have_.

“I – no, I can’t,” Brendon says, but he sounds uncertain. “What would I _do_?”

“Anything you liked,” his dad says. “Get a job. Stay home with us. Go to college.”

Brendon laughs wildly. “I can’t go to _college_ ,” he says. “I didn’t finish high school—”

“The ringmaster, Mr Way?” his mom interrupts. “He told us that all of the circus kids got tutoring until they were eighteen. So you’ve got that, and there’s ways to get into college from that. We’d pay for you.”

“ _Mom_ ,” Brendon says, voice shaky. “We’re in the middle of a tour—”

“After the tour finishes, then,” his dad says firmly. “We can wait. Brendon, we don’t want to have to wait years between seeing you ever again. The circus is unreliable, and you’re amazing at what you do but it’s _dangerous_ too. Please, come home.”

“I’m not – you wouldn’t like it,” Brendon says a little desperately. “I’m not like I was, fuck, I don’t – I drink caffeine and I swear all the fucking time and I don’t believe in _God_! I can’t just come back and go back to how it was before—”

“We’re not _asking_ you to,” his mom says, and she sounds close to tears. “Brendon, we understand that you’ve changed. We were proud, and we were stupid, but we love you and we can accept you for who you are. Don’t think that just because – just because you have different beliefs you’re not welcome—”

“He wasn’t welcome for ten years because of them,” Ryan snarls, suddenly finding his voice, and Brendon looks at him in a shocked kind of way, as if he’s forgotten that Ryan was even there. Brendon takes a deep breath and turns slightly, visibly calming himself.

“Ryan,” Brendon says gently, and Ryan bristles, glaring at him, because he doesn’t like the mindlessly soothing tone in Brendon’s voice.

“It’s true,” he says, tilts his chin up, daring Brendon to challenge him on this.

“I know that,” Brendon says. “But things are – things are different now, and.”

“And what,” Ryan spits. “You’re just going to leave? Just like that? What about—” _me_ , he wants to say, _me and us and our act and all the things we’re going to be, all the things we’re going to do_ , “—the circus? You’re just going to abandon everyone?”

“Ryan,” Brendon says, quietly. “Can you give us a moment? I think. I think we need to talk alone, for a little while.”

Ryan stares at him and then nods sharply, and turns on his heel to walk away. He walks fast, doesn’t linger back to try and hear what they’re talking about, just goes and sits on the step leading up to his trailer. Spencer comes out to ask what’s wrong and he explains in a short, sharp sentence, and Spencer looks upset but doesn’t say anything, just nods and goes back inside. Ryan thinks he must look frightening, must look furious, because everyone walking past avoids meeting his gaze and no one stops to talk like normal.

Brendon turns up an hour later, looking quiet and exhausted. Ryan lifts his chin and Brendon says, “They’re going to stop by tomorrow morning. Give me a night to sleep on it. I’ll tell you then.”

Then he turns around and goes into his trailer, leaving Ryan standing uncertainly on his feet and staring after him.

*

Ryan thinks about going to bed for a moment and then dismisses it, knowing that he’ll never be able to sleep. He heads down to the Big Top instead, figuring that the only possible way he’ll be able to clear his head right now is in the trapeze, and it’s nice at night, anyway, when the tent’s empty and it’s just him and Brendon, calling out to each other up in the sky.

It takes him a moment to remember that there’s no Brendon tonight, and that’s ridiculous, considering Brendon is exactly what he needs to think about. He lets out a shaky breath and shoves his hands in his pockets to stop them trembling, because that’ll be really bad on the trapeze.

When he gets in there, though, the tent isn’t abandoned like he thought it would be. Amanda is sitting at her piano, plucking out notes carefully, stopping and going back over certain lines now and again. They sound kind of familiar. Ryan hangs in the doorway, unsure whether to go away and get annoyed over the fact that it’s taken, or just suck it up and come in, but in the end Amanda makes the decision, looking up and smiling at him.

“Hey, kiddo,” she says. “What’s up?”

“Sorry,” he says automatically. “I didn’t think anyone else was here. I was going to come down and just – try some stuff out. Sorry.”

Amanda grins at him, shrugs her shoulders. “Come on in,” she says. “You don’t mind me being here, do you? I was just figuring out some covers.”

“Oh, right,” Ryan says, the song clicking into place in his head. “Death Cab For Cutie, right? I like that song.”

Amanda nods. “Come practice,” she says. “I won’t be here long.”

“I don’t mind,” Ryan says, and is relieved to find that he doesn’t, after all. Amanda nods and resumes her playing and Ryan goes through, chalks up his hand and does a few preliminary stretches. It sucks, on some levels, because he should be feeling loose and free and calm after all the stretching and the show already tonight, but instead he’s wound tight with tension and anger, furious at Brendon’s mom and dad and sister but especially Brendon.

Especially, _especially_ Brendon, and Ryan flips up into the air with a fast, constrained movement, none of the usual languidness about movement that he likes. The swing seems to move faster than usual as if it senses his need for speed, need to escape everything on the ground, but it can’t match his own racing thoughts and he flips through somersaults and jumps and twists with his stomach churning and his head reeling from the events of the night.

It’s weird, but Ryan’s a pretty pessimistic person in some respects, and he’s imagined falling or injuring himself and never being able to work on the trapeze again, imagined countless crazy and unlikely events in which he gets fired from the circus, spent a while only a few days ago wondering if it was possible that he and Brendon could ruin their relationship by changing it; he thinks up worst case scenarios for nearly everything he does and has had people get annoyed at him for his negative attitude quite frequently, but he has never, ever imagined Brendon leaving. He’s not sure he’s even entertained it as a vague possibility before and now, now the very idea makes him want to throw up and curl into a ball, not move until Brendon promises that he won’t ever.

Ryan’s not sure if he could stop Brendon, is the thing. The past few weeks seem too full of shifting territory, and Ryan suddenly starts thinking about all the things he takes for granted about Brendon, the warmth that spreads wherever Brendon touches him, the way Brendon always makes him laugh or smile or just feel centred, feel like the world’s going to be fine. He feels a little stupid and a little cliché thinking all of this out now but at the same time he feels like his universe isn’t centred around being on the trapeze like it normally is, and maybe it never was, because all he can think about is Brendon lying in his little bed in his trailer making a decision that’s going to change Ryan’s world forever.

The song Amanda’s playing drifts up towards him – she’s finally figured it all out – slow and purposeful, and Ryan stops moving quite so frantically, slows to fit the music and stay in time with it. He breathes as deep and even as he can, and listens to Amanda sing below him, voice sweet and true.

The melody is a familiar one and Ryan spins, twisting his face up to the top of the tent. It’s never as fun on the trapeze on your own, there’s not such an element of flight and spontaneity to it, but Ryan tries to keep the movement of his body slow and in control nevertheless, similar to what he used to do in the bridge of Coin Operated Boy.

Ryan thinks of slow, absolute purposes and the inevitable; thinks of Brendon’s dark eyes above him and Brendon’s hand curled around his wrist and hips moving close; thinks of tumbling out into the night after a show, exhilarated and breathless and happy; thinks, _oh_ , and Amanda says, “I’ll follow you into the dark.”

*

Ryan only heads back towards his trailer when Bob sticks his head through the doorway and tells him to, long after Amanda has gone off to bed. Ryan’s still not tired, mind wide-awake and buzzing, but his body is aching and he’s cautiously optimistic about the changes of getting some sleep.

When he walks into the mass of trailers though, he turns left for Brendon’s automatically and ends up hesitating outside the door, wondering about what kind of welcome he can expect to find inside. It’s likely that Brendon wants to be on his own, curled into his bunk with his headphones turned up loud, that he doesn’t want to talk to anyone. Ryan knows Brendon in these moods and he can understand why he’d be like that now, but he thinks that maybe Brendon needs some kind of reminder so that he doesn’t get all caught up in the melodrama of family and reuniting and Lifetime movies. _Ryan’s_ not going to do anything that dramatic, but he wants to be there.

He pushes open the door – nobody ever bothers locking – and sneaks in, footsteps soft in the dark. He’s halfway across the floor when Tom sticks his head out of his bunk and says, sleepily, “Ryan?”

“Shush,” Ryan whispers. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“S’okay,” Tom says and yawns, mouth seeming to take up his whole face for a moment. Ryan waits and Tom smiles blearily at him. His hair is sticking up in eight different directions. “You looking for Brendon?” he asks, and smiles a little regretfully when Ryan nods. “He’s not here, man. He went off hours ago.”

Ryan nods again even though there’s no need to, gaze fixed on the ground. “Did he say he’d be back?” he asks.

“No,” Tom says, sure but not unkind. “Sorry.”

“Um,” Ryan says. “Maybe I’ll just – crash on your couch. Just in case.”

“Ryan,” Tom says, looking concerned. “He took his pajamas with him. Look, is everything—”

“Everything’s fine,” Ryan says, and shakes out the spare blanket. “I’ll just stay here. Just in case.”

Tom nods and disappears back into his bunk, and Ryan stretches out on the couch, pulling the blanket over him. He rolls over and presses his feet against the soft cushions. It takes him a long time to fall asleep, after all.

*

The next morning he goes back to his trailer and gets changed while Spencer’s in the shower, doesn’t feel up to dealing with the inevitable questions about where he was last night, or if he knows anything more about Brendon. Brendon hasn’t made any decisions yet, Ryan tells himself firmly, hasn’t told anyone anything and when he does, Ryan will probably be the first to know. He doesn’t need to stress yet.

He stands still for a moment, leaning against the wall, before he heads down towards the trapeze, until the queasy feeling in his stomach subsides. The ground still seems a little unsteady beneath him, and as he draws closer to the Big Top he looks up and sees Brendon’s unmistakeable form up on the hill to the right of the tent. He’s standing with his family, back to Ryan, and they are too far away for Ryan to see their faces properly. Nevertheless, he stops and stands there watching for a while anyway, until Brendon leans in closer to his mom and then turns slightly, waves a little hesitantly at him. Ryan ducks his head and hurries on towards the tent.

He gets in there, though, and looks at the trapeze and feels the beginning pain of a headache in his temples at the very thought of going on it. He ends up sliding into a row of seats about halfway down, in the middle of the row with his knees drawn up to his chest. He stares down at the ring and wonders what it will be like to do a solo routine. Maybe, he thinks, Gerard will make him get another partner. Most acrobats work with tons of different partners through their career and don’t feel the need to complain or get worked up about it. He himself spent his first – somewhat disastrous – year onstage with Brent, and that was okay, considering he’d only joined two years ago, it was _fine_. It wasn’t amazing, but it was bearable.

Maybe, he thinks, Gerard will let him stay with the circus and do odd jobs even if he doesn’t perform anymore. He’s not sure if he could perform anymore.

Footsteps sound in the tent at the doorway and Ryan doesn’t turn around, stays exactly where he is and waits for Brendon to come to him. Brendon slides into the seat next to him but Ryan doesn’t look at him, too frightened of what he might see on Brendon’s goddamned, easy-to-read face. Brendon hums out something mindlessly soft and comforting and leans close, arm sliding around Ryan’s shoulders. Ryan is warm everywhere they touch; he forces himself to keep still, and wonders how he could have been so _stupid_.

“Hey,” Brendon says. “Hey, Ryan, look at me.”

Ryan breathes, “Fuck you,” into his knees, hoping for a reaction, but all Brendon does is sigh again and slump closer.

“I’m sorry about last night,” he says, mouth close to Ryan’s ear. “I didn’t mean to – Spencer said you were upset.”

Ryan raises his head then, disbelieving. “Upset,” he echoes, and turns slowly to look at Brendon sitting wide-eyed and uncertain next to him. “ _Upset_ – Brendon, what the fuck, you’re _leaving_ —” and then he stops worrying about this, stops trying to work out hows and whys and grabs Brendon’s collar instead, twists uncomfortably across the chair arm between them and mashes his mouth inelegantly to Brendon’s. It’s not a very good kiss; the angle is awkward and messy and their nose bump, teeth crashing together. It’s over in a second, too, when Ryan releases Brendon and sits back breathless, two spots of colour high on his cheeks.

“Uh,” Brendon says, staring at him and Ryan moves, over that arm between them and half into Brendon’s lap in a flurry of uncoordinated limbs.

Brendon reacts when Ryan kisses him this time, arms going around his shoulders and hugging him close. He opens his mouth and it’s still messy and clumsy but fuck, fuck, Ryan didn’t even know he needed this. He grabs Brendon’s chin in his hand and pulls away a bit, meets his gaze dark and intent and says, “I know they’re your family. I _know_. But I’m asking you, please, _please_ don’t go. I need you here.”

“Ryan,” Brendon says, sitting up and knocking their foreheads together. “Ryan, fuck, I’m not going. I never would – I told them, today, I just needed a night to consider my options and then I couldn’t find you—”

Ryan laughs finally, hoarse and grateful and he slumps forward and presses his open mouth messily at the junction between Brendon’s neck and shoulder, feels Brendon jump at his touch. He says, “I thought you were already gone, that you’d gone to stay with them. You weren’t in your trailer, and Tom says you took your pajamas—”

“I slept in your bed last night,” Brendon tells him, and smiles sweet and nervous.

Then they’re kissing again and it’s better, now, fitting into each other the way they do, Brendon’s hands slipping under Ryan’s shirt to lie warm against his skin. Ryan arches into his touch and slips a little lower to nuzzle at the line of Brendon’s jaw.

Brendon whispers, “You don’t have to do that, to convince me. I’ll never—”

“Brendon,” Ryan says, “I’m kind of stupidly in love with you. Shut the fuck up.”

Brendon smiles. “Me, too,” he says, and Ryan lets out a breath and doesn’t ask him to clarify. When Ryan tilts his face up to him, Brendon cups his cheek in his palm and says, clearly, “Always have been.”

Ryan stays still then, and they slide closer together, stop kissing and just stay quiet for a moment. Ryan can feel Brendon’s pulse against his skin and he closes his eyes and pretends it’s his own.

*

They skip practice for the first time in years and head back to Ryan’s trailer, stopping now and then to press each other into dark corners and make out, hips rocking together, mouths forceful. Ryan has never been so grateful in his life to find Spencer gone and he closes and locks the door. When he turns around Brendon is watching him, eyes dark, back straight. Ryan walks towards him and Brendon meets him halfway across the floor.

They stumble back towards the couch and Brendon pulls away from Ryan long enough to pull his own shirt off and then Ryan’s, tugging impatiently until Ryan lifts his arms and allows Brendon to drag it off. Brendon looks at him then, eyes bright and happy, and laughs, “Dude, your hair is _fucked_ —” but Ryan refuses to let himself be distracted, not when there’s all this skin that he’s seen and held up a million times before but has never been allowed to touch quite like this.

He pushes Brendon down beneath him on the couch and kisses him hard once, then shimmies down (Brendon laughs, breathless and surprised and delighted) and nips lightly at Brendon’s collarbone. He slides down further, all his weight on Brendon, and licks his nipple. Brendon goes very still and Ryan pauses, then drags it lightly in his mouth, kissing a little wetly, and Brendon throws his head back and actually groans. Ryan jerks his head up at that and stares, because he’s known Brendon for nine years but he’s never heard _that_ noise before. It shouldn’t surprise him but does, and Brendon stares back at him, eyes dark and mouth red and swollen, and pushes his hips impatiently up at Ryan.

“Fine,” Ryan mumbles and shifts away, settles himself between Brendon’s legs so that he can unzip Brendon’s fly and pull his fucking skin tight jeans down (they get stuck around Brendon’s knees and Ryan gives up, leaves them there). He’s gentler with Brendon’s boxers, freeing his cock and taking a moment to glance up at Brendon, who watches him with the same look of confusion and exhilaration that Ryan feels. Ryan laughs and lies down, shifting until he’s settled and Brendon’s glaring at him.

“You comfortable down there, Ross?” Brendon snaps eventually. “Want me to fetch you a cushion?”

“Will it have tassels?” Ryan asks and then, when Brendon raises himself on his elbows and goes to hit him, he licks the palm of his hand and takes hold of the base of Brendon’s cock. Brendon makes a small, breathy noise that Ryan files away to mock later, and then arches his hips lazily into Ryan’s grip when Ryan moves his hand, brushing his thumb over the head of Brendon’s cock.

“Stay still,” Ryan warns, and then moves forward, licks at the head a little tentatively. He’s given blow jobs before, even been complimented on them, but it’s different now. This is _Brendon_ and Ryan feels like all his tricks and finery has been swept away, like he has nothing to fall back on. He sucks just slightly and Brendon mumbles something small and wanting but doesn’t move, and Ryan bobs down a little bit, tries to adjust to the sudden, uncomfortable fullness of his mouth and forces his throat to relax. Brendon moans above him, and then says Ryan’s name suddenly, and again, and Ryan goes down further. It’s still a weird sensation, having someone else’s cock in your mouth, always has been, and Ryan’s not entirely sure he _loves_ it, but the noises Brendon’s making, his ragged, fast breathing is really fucking hot, and Ryan rocks his hips against the couch once, twice, trying to get some kind of friction despite his jeans.

Brendon says, “Fuck, can you just—” and then, “Yeah, fuck,” when Ryan cups Brendon’s balls in one hand, fingers gentle. He presses his free hand to his own cock, pushing against his jeans, and then he groans deep in his throat, can’t help it. Brendon bucks up against him at that, gasping, “Sorry, fuck, sorry,” and then he pulls blindly at Ryan’s hair, tugging him up.

Ryan looks up at him, mouth swollen and wet and says, “What?”

“First date,” Brendon says, and whines a little bit in the back of his throat, pushing his cock into Ryan’s hand kind of frantically. “I’m, trying to be a gentleman, god—”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Ryan says impatiently, and goes on him again. Brendon makes a small, choking sound and then comes, hips jerking up in a strange, offbeat way that makes Ryan think Brendon’s trying not to choke him. He appreciates the effort, and pulls off and swallows, throat working. He doesn’t mind the taste, actually, and it makes Brendon stare at him with wide, stunned eyes, so he smiles a little bit.

“You’ve got a,” Brendon says, voice slurring, and then he sits up with a bit of a struggle, kicking his jeans off as he does so, and smoothes a thumb over the corner of Ryan’s mouth, catching a bit of come that’s smeared there. Ryan leans forward and catches Brendon’s hand, lowers his mouth and sucks at his thumb deliberately, and Brendon laughs shaky and unbelieving.

“Fuck,” he says, and then pulls Ryan close and kisses him firmly. It reminds Ryan of how hard he is and he squirms onto Brendon’s lap, pushes himself against him. They haven’t managed to be very graceful for two acrobats so far, he thinks a little blindly, and probably rutting against Brendon like a teenager isn’t one of his finest moments, but he can’t quite bring himself to stop.

Brendon manoeuvres him around until Ryan’s underneath him and then he pulls down Ryan’s jeans and works his hand into Ryan’s boxers, grips his cock and strokes firmly. Ryan makes a small, helpless noise and arches up against him and Brendon leans down and kisses him again, and Ryan’s mouth is tingling, he feels stupid happy and spoiled. Brendon tightens his grip just right and then he puts his mouth against Ryan’s ear and remarks, almost conversationally, “I’m going to fuck you, in a sec,” and Ryan’s world blurs in front of him as he comes over Brendon’s hand and his stomach.

“Uh,” he says, when he can convince his mouth to move again and Brendon starts to laugh, shifts forward and sprawls heavily across Ryan, burying his face in Ryan’s neck.

“Next time,” he says, and Ryan starts laughing too, can’t help it.

*

The bed is too fucking small for both of them like this, and Ryan’s just glad it’s not an actual bunk, because one of them accidentally banging their heads would be really unromantic at this point. Brendon looks up at him kind of crossly and smacks his hip lightly as some kind of demented reminder that Brendon’s there, which is ridiculous, Ryan thinks, it’s not very likely that he’d forget what with Brendon sucking his dick and all.

Brendon’s good at this, too, mouth sliding hot and wet when he bobs down and Ryan stops worrying about the bunks after a little while and slips down from his elbows, head thrown back against the covers, mouth moving and making soundless shapes. Fuck, he thinks, fuck, Brendon, and then he realises he’s not thinking it, he’s saying it aloud.

Then Brendon pulls off and Ryan whines pitifully. Brendon laughs softly, breath ghosting out over Ryan’s cock and Ryan gasps, “Come on, Brendon, please—” and proceeds to shut up because Brendon’s licking a long line down the underside of Ryan’s cock, and then across and behind his balls and Ryan moans, too loud in the warm afternoon.

Then Brendon traces his tongue around the tight pucker of Ryan’s hole, and Ryan makes an odd, broken noise that gets stuck in his throat somewhere on the way out, and arches his hips, upward. Brendon whispers, “Okay?”

“Fuck,” Ryan says, voice all scratchy. “Um, yes? Please?”

“Uh-huh,” Brendon says, and this time he slides his tongue right in and it’s – Ryan can’t think properly, the feel of Brendon’s mouth warm and soft and his tongue lapping in, and then Brendon slides a slick finger in next to his tongue and Ryan can’t help it, lets out a rough sob.

“Please, Brendon, please, I need, I want you,” he babbles mindlessly, and Brendon slides a second finger in, crooks them inside Ryan and Ryan moans noisily. “Come on, don’t make me – Brendon, now, come on, don’t make me beg—”

“You know,” Brendon says, pseudo-thoughtfully (and he’d probably pull off the act a lot more if he wasn’t breathless), “I think I’d kinda like that.”

“Fuck,” Ryan says, screws his eyes tight, and Brendon shoves his fingers up harder, twisting them almost viciously, and then his tongue’s back, soothing in comparison. “Fuck,” Ryan says again, “Please, Bren, fuck me, please.”

“Yeah,” Brendon says, and his fingers are gone and then he’s pulling Ryan’s legs wider apart, positioning the head of his cock at Ryan’s ass (and wow, Brendon’s fast, Ryan hadn’t even noticed him opening the condom) and then he hesitates. Ryan thinks he’s being just really, really unfair for a moment, and then Brendon leans down and brushes a light kiss against Ryan’s temple and thrusts in, and Ryan’s back arches and he grabs at Brendon’s arms, saying something mindless and incoherent, as Brendon fucks into him at just the right angle, fuck, and Ryan’s pretty much gone at this point.

“God, Ryan,” Brendon says, and his voice is wobbling a little bit, but he pushes into Ryan firm and steady and if it wasn’t for how his arms are trembling, how his face is almost blissful and lifted upwards, mouth red and hanging open, Ryan would think he was impressively (and unfairly) in control of the whole thing.

Brendon shifts and adjusts his weight appropriately (and hits a new spot inside Ryan and oh, that’s good too, and Ryan moans, hips jerking up in time for each thrust), and then he starts to jerk Ryan off and it’s almost too much, Brendon in him and above him and around him. Ryan wants to tell him what a mistake all his stupid fretting and over thinking was, wants to apologise for being a coward. Instead, he just gasps out Brendon’s name, again, and Brendon says his name back and they move together, because that’s what they’re good at.

*

“You _guys_!” Spencer yells, pounding on the door. “Seriously, this isn’t _funny_ —” and Brendon collapses into a new spasm of laughter, “—you’re both disgusting. Show’s in an hour and a half! Come _on_ , I need to get my stuff!”

“We’re asleep!” Ryan yells back at the door and Brendon laughs so hard he rolls out of the bed.

“I share a trailer with you!” Spencer hollers through the firmly locked door. “There better not be anything disgusting waiting in there for me when I get in – and I swear to god, Ryan Ross, I _will_ get in!”

“Fuck,” Brendon says, stopping laughing suddenly and sitting up to stare at Ryan with huge eyes, hair sticking up in every direction. “Did we clean the couch?”

*

They share a shower and get dressed in their costumes in the trailer, and it’s easier to stay calm than Ryan would have thought with Brendon here centring him, cursing when he hops into his trousers and tries to brush his hair at the same time, leaning in to kiss Ryan before he gets all tangled up in his shirt. It’s easier not to worry about the show tonight, and how different it might all be.

Brendon grabs his hand before they leave and Ryan can’t help it, turns to him and says, “Whatever happens tonight, I’m glad, okay?”

“Whatever happens?” Brendon echoes, laughing a little bit. “Are we about to go fight a war, Ryan Ross?”

“No, I mean,” Ryan says, and then stops, searching for words. “Everything we’ve ever talked about with journalists, everything we’ve got onstage and ruining that, and—”

“Um,” Brendon says, regarding Ryan quizzically. “You really think any of that’s true? Dude, no offence, you’re hot and all, but I don’t think I’m going to jump you in the middle of a performance. I’m not _Frank_.”

Ryan looks at the floor a little unhappily and says, “No, I know that, but like – you and me are different, now.”

“Ah, yes,” Brendon says solemnly. “I’m thinking about hosting a seminar, actually. Sex With Ryan Ross: A Life Changing Decision. Got a ring to it, don’t you think?”

“Brendon,” Ryan says, voice tight. “You’re not taking this seriously.”

Brendon laughs and moves forward, presses Ryan up against the door of the trailer. “Hey,” he says, close enough that Ryan goes a little cross-eyed trying to look at him properly and Brendon laughs again, short and warm. “I take _you_ seriously. I _don’t_ take half of the shit you say seriously, because otherwise you’d have driven me fucking insane about a million years ago. Listen. The show’s going to be awesome, like it usually is, unless one of us is a bit off, which has happened a hundred times before and doesn’t _matter_. We’ll be fine, and afterwards, you can fuck me behind the tent. Okay?”

Ryan swallows hard and looks at Brendon, nods once. “Okay,” he says, and Brendon kisses him easily, drawing Ryan close by his belt loops.

“Anyway,” Brendon says when they break away and start off down towards the Big Top. “You haven’t popped a boner on the trapeze since you were sixteen, remember?”

“Oh my God, _one time_ ,” Ryan says, and punches Brendon hard in the shoulder.

*

“Um,” Ray says, staring awkwardly up at them. “You guys? I know you wanted a last minute practice, but we’re about to let everybody in, and you kind of need to get down and uh, stop…”

“Seriously, guys,” Bob says. “We’re really happy that you guys have sorted your shit out and all—” Gerard practically beams up at them, looking delighted, “—but we really need to start the show, so you need to stop making out and get backstage.”

Brendon breaks away reluctantly and grins at Ryan, smooths back his somewhat wild hair. “Well,” he says. “Reckon we’ll ever practice ever again?”

Ryan wants to freak out about that, too, wants to say _fuck, we have to, we can’t let this change what we’ve made of ourselves_ , but Brendon’s got that stupid, awesome smile that takes up his whole face on and Ryan just shrugs and says diffidently, “Eh, we’re pretty good anyway.”

*

Ryan paces around backstage, smoothing his hands over his vest again and again and checking in numerous mirrors to make sure his make-up is all fine. Spencer watches him with a mixture of amusement and annoyance and Ryan resolves not to walk too close to him, just in case he gets punched (Spencer did it once before a show, and his arm was really sore for the whole fucking thing. Spencer is _mean_ ).

Eventually, Brendon grabs his arm as he walks past and shoves him down into a chair. “Hey,” he says, moving closer. “Stop it. I’m right here, okay? Focus on me.”

Ryan takes deep breaths and Brendon’s face swims before his gaze for a moment, and then Brendon tightens his grip and the five points of pressure on his arm give him something to concentrate. He forces himself to feel every ache in his body, his ass still a little tender (not the first time he’d been fucked, but the first time in a while) and his eyes heavy from a restless sleep the night before. He feels it all and breathes in and out and knows exactly what he can do with his body, and Brendon is right there, hand holding him in place.

Ryan stands up and Brendon keeps close to him; they lean together, foreheads touching, and Ryan keeps his eyes open and focused. Brendon raises his free hand absently to scratch at his elbow and Ryan feels the phantom itch, and then Gerard is calling out their names and Brendon is smiling at him, a face to follow through the twists backstage and in Ryan’s head. Spotlights are bright around him and Ryan looks out into the faceless, nameless audience and feels them look back. He climbs up the pole fast and easy, and it is firm and familiar under his weight, and then he throws himself out into the open space and Brendon catches him.


End file.
